Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2009 July 23

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July 23

Three-part Organic Chemistry Question

Question 1:Is there any shortcut, or formula which enable's one to find out the exact number of structural isomers of an organic compound, when the number is as high as 36 or more? It's not possible (especially during a competitive exam) to draw all the possible structures on a rough space....
Question 2:How can one find out the order of stability of different resonating structures of a compound? Let's say, for example that the first structure shows a benzene ring with one carbon sharing a double bond with an oxygen atom. The next figure shows a -ve charge on O and a +ve charge on the corresponding C. The next structure shows that one of the C-C double bonds have shifted inside the benzene ring and so on. Is there any way to determine which structure's the most stable, which one's the least stable, and so on and so forth?
Question 3:It's advised that "acid-sensitive substrates" should undergo Wolff-Kishner reduction, while those that are sensitive to bases should undergo Clemmensen's reduction. What exactly do they mean by acid or base sensitive? 117.194.231.58 (talk) 05:08, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

• 1 The math of Combinatorics will allow you to determine the possible configurations of any finite number of objects.
• 2 The usual method of calculating the best resonance structure involves assigning Formal charge to all of the atoms in the structure; the best structure is the one with the lowest formal changes on each atom; thus a 3-atom compound with two resonance structures:

 X==Y--Z structure
 +1 0 -1 formal charges

 X--Y==Z structure
+2  0 -2 formal charges

The top structure is favored because it has the lowest individual formal charges. Also, if there is a tie between two structures using this method, the second method of determining the best structure is to place negative charges on the most electronegative atom. Consider something like this:

 O==C--N structure
 +1 0 -1 formal charges

 O--C==N structure
 -1 0 +1 formal charges

The bottom structure is favored here because, though the numbers are equal in both structures, the lower one places the -1 charge on oxygen rather than nitrogen. If two resonance structure are exactly equivalent, for example:

 O==C--O

 O--C==O

Then you would need to consider both contributing equally to the overall bond order of the molecule.

• 3 Acid sensitive merely means that substances that would tend to react with acids; base sensitive means substances that would tend to react with bases. When doing an acid-catalyzed reaction (or a base-catalyzed reaction), you don't actually want the acid (or base) producing unwanted side-reactions with your reactants. If the substrate would undergo a direct reaction with the acid preferentially to the reaction with the INTENDED other substrate, then you would want to avoid acid-catalyzed mechanisms. --Jayron32 05:32, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Number 1, I don't know Combinatorics. Number two, shouldn't the formal charges on nitrogen be zero for both the structures you've drawn? At least, that's according to the article on formal charge in Wikipedia... I'm thoroughly confused... 117.194.230.187 (talk) 07:31, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Eliminating Cat allergens

(Before you ask this is not asking for medical advice, rather it is about the mechanics of allergens and how to get rid of them)

I have a mild cat allergy and it doesn't cause me problems except when I touch the cat and rub my eyes afterwards. Doing so, even if I have washed my hands several times, causes a lot of itching and eye irritation. Not rubbing my eyes isn't an answer as they get irritated by other allergens such as dust and pollen to a lesser extent).

Surely, if I have washed my hands in hot water with soap, it would have destroyed or washed off the nasty critters that cause this irritation but it seems not as the stuff seems to stay on my hands for literally hours. Would washing my hands with antibacterial soap destroy the allergens? I assume not as I don't think they're bacteria. If anyone can give me an explanation as to how and why these allergens seem to have a half-life exceeding that of plutonium I'd be very grateful! Otherwise, I'll buy some 'Petal Cleanse', which you rub on the offending feline's fur and apparantly it blocks the allergens but it's expensive and I'm apprehensive as to whether it would work.

Airborne allergens don't seem to be an issue as the cat has not caused my asthma to flare up while simply being in a house where a dog lives causes that to get really bad. It's just the mechanical transfer of allergens from the cat to my hands to my eyes that is causing me a problem.

Ta! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.25.96.244 (talk) 11:25, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure how much it helps, but have you seen the Cat allergy article? It says that the main allergen is Fel d 1, whose article agrees with you that it's a very sticky protein, although it doesn't say why. 212.114.159.142 (talk) 11:55, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I have an idea - according to Denaturation_(biochemistry), ethanol (which is just another name for alcohol) is a protein denaturing agent - you could try one of those alcohol based hand sanitisers - this might denature the protein sufficiently to prevent the reaction. Exxolon (talk) 01:31, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll try an alcohol-based hand scrub! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.25.96.244 (talk) 10:05, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

SOLAR ECLIPSE !!!!!

WHY IS THAT HARMFUL RAYS ARE SAID TO COME ONLY DURING SOLAR ECLIPSE?? WHAT HAS MOON COMING IN BETWEEN EARTH AND SUN GOT TO DO WITH THE HARMFUL RAYS RECEIVED ESPECIALLY AT ECLIPSES???... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.193.144.160 (talk) 13:26, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Please don't post in all caps, it's considered shouting and rude as well as being more difficult to read. Now, on to the question. There are no particularly harmful rays during a solar eclipse that are not present during normal daylight. The specific dangers are that, since it's dark and the sun looks unusual, you're likely to stare directly at the sun, and your pupils are likely to be dilated. You end up staring at the sun far longer than is safe, and this damages your eyes. Many sites document this issue in detail: you may find the Straight Dope and NASA of interest, among others. — Lomn 13:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Please don't write in all caps. The rays that you are referring to are always coming from the sun. What is different is that it is quite painful to damage your eyes by looking at the sun because of the intensity. However, when the moon crosses the sun, the intensity of light is greatly reduced, but it can still do damage to your eyes. This means that you can damage your sight without the usual pain signals. Googlemeister (talk) 13:31, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Worse still - people try to be careful about that - and end up using sunglasses or other kinds of "shielding" that don't help to save your eyes - and may actually make matters worse. In some parts of the world, unscrupulous people will try to sell you things that don't work. We've had many questions of this sort over the past few weeks and I strongly suggest that you look back at some of the earlier questions in our archive. SteveBaker (talk) 13:40, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

In the UK you can't usually get the kind of the sunglasses that make matters worse any more. They were usually targeted at children (as toy sunglasses) so when people realised the harm they were doing there was a big outcry and they were either banned or were effectively banned by public opinion (I'm not sure). If anyone is interested, the problem with that kind of cheap sunglasses is that they block visible light, but not UV light, so your pupils dilate due to the darkness and lots of harmful UV gets it, more than would have got in normally. It should be noted, of course, that even good quality sunglasses are not enough to protect your eyes when looking directly at the sun - you need specially designed eclipse glasses. If you can't get them, project the sun onto a piece of paper using a pinhole or binoculars (don't look through the binoculars, whatever you do!). --Tango (talk) 15:42, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Or you could wear the helmet used for arc welding. Googlemeister (talk) 16:49, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I have known people do that, but I wouldn't recommend it simply because they are not designed for that purpose so you can't be sure they will do the job correctly. (Unless you happen to be an expert on both solar observation and welding masks.) --Tango (talk) 17:09, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Welding and sunlight both produce incredible amounts of UV radiation, which is why a #14 welder's glass is the recommended protection for looking at an eclipse. --Carnildo (talk) 00:52, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps the question is referring to the superstitious beliefs described here. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 17:48, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

BICYCLE BALANCING???

why is that it is very easy to balnce on a moving bicycle rather than a stationery one?? The answer to this question is concerned with the centre of mass of cycle.I am not clear of the answer..so i seek a proper explanation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.193.144.160 (talk) 13:30, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

We answered this question just a couple of days ago. The answer is read one of the best articles on Wikipedia: Bicycle and motorcycle dynamics - it's very approachable and has great graphics that explain things nicely. SteveBaker (talk) 13:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Specifically, the previous discussion is at the 15 July archive. — Lomn 13:38, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gd iitm (talk • contribs) 13:49, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Dreams.

Is it possible to know in your dreams that you are dreaming??In 99.99 % of my dreams I have never known that I was dreaming.But some people do say that they can know that they are dreaming.Is it a bluff or a rare capability of some?? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.193.144.160 (talk) 13:47, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Lucid dreaming. It's supposedly an ability which can be learned. AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 14:06, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it is. I have done it sometimes. Almost every time I woke up as soon as I realized it, but sometimes I realize it's a dream and don't wake up for long periods of time. I sometimes manipulate the dream and do random things like flying. It rarely happens though. Dogposter (talk) 14:18, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Lost in the edit-conflict.. Oh well I basically said - Yes I have these. I have bad dreams where i know it's a dream and i'm trying to make myself wake up so it can stop. Usually in these dreams my body is paralysed and i'm trying to make myself move so I can slap myself or knock something over onto myself so I wake up. Invariably I end up trying to rock my body to try fall out of the bed. I've never (yet) woken up out of the bed but usually I do wake up. Dreams are crazy (and only interesting to the person that has them - due to the difficulty of explaining the sheer randomness of them - i find). 194.221.133.226 (talk) 15:00, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

There are some great accounts by Richard Feynman (a nobel prize-winning physicist) about his experiments on sleep - he managed to interact with his dreams - steer them in a direction he wanted. However, after a while, he began to become aware that doing this was making his sleep less effective and he became greatly concerned about what it was doing to his mental state - so he abandoned the experimentation. Several of his autobiographies discuss it - but I don't have any of them with me right now - so I can't be sure which one. SteveBaker (talk) 15:02, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! has a section on lucid dreaming. APL (talk) 15:18, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I think the point of dreaming is, by and large, to experience a reality outside the drab mundanity of everyday life. The notion that you are dreaming, while dreaming, is not all that compatible with this experience of a different reality. So, if it were possible to become aware that a dream is a dream while dreaming, it may not be in your best interest. Therefore your subconscious will foil any attempts to override this seperateness between dreaming and actuality. Vranak (talk) 16:15, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that what the brain is doing while dreaming is the rough equivelant of 'defragging' the hard drive on your PC. Memories, ideas and thoughts are being rearrange for more efficient access - and while they are in motion, nothing works right. This explains the strange randomness - yet familiarity of dreams where small snippets of reality are stitched together in a rather random way. If we don't dream sufficiently - our thought processes start to take longer and we rapidly get symptoms like memory loss, confusion, etc...we behave much like a PC that needs defragging! Getting into the process and driving it in some kind of conscious manner seems like a rather dangerous thing to do - and that's precisely what Feynman began to realise too. By interfering with the reorganisation of his memories, etc - he was doing himself some kind of mental injury...at least as severe as not dreaming at all. If that's true (and there is no way to be sure) - then doing this trick is something you should do fairly rarely - and only when you're able to get a good night's sleep soon afterwards. SteveBaker (talk) 00:10, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Hey, that's a good way to think of it. 98.234.126.251 (talk) 23:53, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Braininess..

Is it true that "the bigger your head the more intelligent you are.." or is it a myth??Anyway what makes one person more intelligent than others???I tried browsing..but none gave me proper explanation —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.193.139.157 (talk) 14:54, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

see Neuroscience and intelligence and Craniometry. No - it's not really a very good indicator. Scratch that - read the article for more info. 194.221.133.226 (talk) 15:01, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Well bigger head=bigger brains in general, and bigger brains means a capability to be more intelligent - though this doesn't mean you can measure IQ by measuring head size.

Brain size is a rudimentary indicator of the intelligence of a brain, and many other factors affect the intelligence of a brain Neuroscience_and_intelligence#Brain_size

Hope your brain was big enough to understand that..83.100.250.79 (talk) 15:04, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

It's certainly not a simple matter of brain size - although people with extremely small brains (Microcephaly) don't have high IQ's. I've read that the amount of wrinkling of the brain surface has some kind of correlation with IQ - which would possibly make sense if the surface area - or the volume of the region just below the surface - mattered somehow...but I suspect that those studies may have been superceded too. If it were simply a matter of brain size then the world would be run by the Elephants - who have vastly bigger brains than us...so we know it's not as simple as that! Part of the problem is that it's not how much brain you have - but how you use it. Exercising your mind makes you smarter. That's one reason I hang out on the WP:RD answering people's questions for free - the mental workout it gives me is worth the price! SteveBaker (talk) 15:07, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Within normal ranges (ie. barring things like Microcephaly), I don't believe there is any correlation between brain size and intelligence in humans. However, there is a correlation between average intelligence and average brain size in difference species of primate. Humans have the largest brains of all primates and are the most intelligent, for example. --Tango (talk) 15:47, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

It is the brainsize to bodysize ratio that matters.In that case humans have the highest.Elephants as mentioned in the wrong context above have comparitively very small ratio. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.193.139.41 (talk) 15:52, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I have heard about this ratio, too, but it doesn't make any sense - why would the size of the body have any impact upon one's intelligence? By this argument, the brain in a jar would be much smarter than the equivalent brain inside a human skull. Tempshill (talk) 16:44, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Uh, a brain in a jar doesn't grow in a jar. The relevance of the ratio has to do with the species. As for why it would be the case, it's an index of how much extra brain power your body has above and beyond regulating its basic functions (which does require brain power, though we think of it as automatic). It actually holds up fairly well—humans are vastly bigger brains equivalent to their average mass than any other species, and the list goes about how you'd expect (elephants are actually fairly smart, ditto dolphins and whales. Dogs do pretty good as well. Chimps do very well. Sheep do horribly, as do rabbits. Birds do OK.) It doesn't apply on a per-individual basis, obviously (Stephen Hawking is not smarter because his body is atrophied). --98.217.14.211 (talk) 17:04, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I think you'll have to cite a source for the claim that "it's an index of how much extra brain power your body has above and beyond regulating its basic functions" is a meaningful statement, with regard to the number of neurons a blue whale needs to regulate its basic functions compared to the number of neurons a dog needs, for example. Tempshill (talk) 17:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

You don't think a blue whale has considerably more neurons per volume of its body than a dog? I don't think it's at all much of a jump to assume that scaling things up requires some extra neural centralization. (Or maybe not centralization, in the case of some of the dinosaurs with the multiple brains to govern different parts of the body and all that.) Anyway, hey, guess what, we have a whole article on this: Brain-to-body mass ratio. I'm not making this up. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 18:03, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I sound like a jerk by typing this, but I see you haven't cited any sources other than our article on the subject, which has a big template at the top warning about notability and WP:OR, which tends to support my tendency to believe that someone is making it up. Tempshill (talk) 19:29, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Here is an article that presents actual data: http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/kinser/Int3.html - it says that small birds beat out humans in brain-to-body mass ratios - but that's kinda cheating because birds have all sorts of mass-reduction tricks built in to help them fly. It's hard to believe that lighter bones mean more intelligence. However, some birds (Parrots, notably) are very intelligent for their brain size - so perhaps there is something in this. SteveBaker (talk) 19:52, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I've heard it alleged that – in loose language – birds think with the volume of their brains, while mammals think with the surface. —Tamfang (talk) 18:51, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Craniologists long wondered if there was much correlation. What complicates things is that brain size by itself doesn't tell you much. Albert Einstein had a relatively average brain, from a physiological perspective. Carl Friedrich Gauss had a very tiny brain (if I recall correctly). There is a lot more to intelligence than brain anatomy, though obviously brain anatomy plays a role in it. There is also evidence that brain anatomy is not fixed; that use of the brain corresponds to which areas get more developed and have more complicated connections. Having a large or small head is no real indication of cognitive ability. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 17:07, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

If you read a decent biography of Einstein, he doesn't come off as being all that intelligent. He was really good at the peculiar kind of lateral thinking it took to do his early work - but he wasn't good at math, he utterly failed to see the significance of the work that all of the other physicists were doing after WWII - and he was a complete klutz at almost every other aspect of his life. It's almost as if the particular skill he had was occupying such a large proportion of his average-sized brain that there was nothing left to handle other aspects of life. He was very much the iconic "nutty professor" who could do his one thing well and almost nothing else. Someone like (my hero) Richard Feynman was just as good at the abstract/physics thinking - but also amazingly talented at just about everything else too. But I still don't think brain size is directly related to this. SteveBaker (talk) 19:40, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Define "wasn't good at math". Compared to who? He did very well in math at schools, and was described by his teachers and tutors as having an exceptional talent for mathematics.

Certainly, there were other physicists that were better than him at math and he occasionally consulted them, but it's not fair to describe the man as "not good at math" because he occasionally had to consult some of the worlds' most brilliant minds.

Some older, and poorly researched biographies of the man described him as doing poorly in school because of a misunderstanding of how his school kept their academic records. [1] APL (talk) 20:32, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Neanderthals had significantly larger cranial capacities than modern man. If they were smarter, they would be here today. We would be Neanderthals. We are not. Therefore brain size does not necessarily denote higher intelligence. Vranak (talk) 18:26, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I was watching a NOVA show and they said that smaller brains in humans are much more efficient because the neurons and synapse are closer together so there is much more connection between all the parts of the brain with less resistance.-- penubag  (talk) 18:49, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't buy that. I don't believe that the difference between a big brained human and a small brained one is that the same number of neurons are packed into a smaller space. Inside every big brain there is a central region which is every bit as dense and closely packed as a smaller brain would be. I also don't buy the argument that if Neanderthals were smarter than modern humans, they'd be here now instead of us. There are any number of possible reasons why an intelligent creature could lose it's ecological niche and die out leaving some smaller (and possibly less intelligent) species in control. There are many other things than intelligence that influence survival and subsequent breeding success. SteveBaker (talk) 19:46, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I Q

continuing from the previous discussion above..how can a person improve his IQ,intelligence..i.e.how can he exercise his brain???Is there any other method other than solving I Q question and yoga??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.193.139.41 (talk) 16:04, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Brain fitness discusses this; unfortunately it seems much easier to become less "brain fit" than more. -- Finlay McWalter Talk 16:07, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

You could study the questions asked on standard IQ tests which will help you answer them better when you next take another IQ test so that your MEASURED IQ would be higher. It is probably not going to have a lot of practical value though. Googlemeister (talk) 16:47, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

In my experience people generally appear smarter once they have learned to better think through things. Critical thinking skills can be developed and improved. Yoga and IQ questions have nothing to do with it, unless you are talking about improving on the tests. (In which case, yes, studying test questions will probably help. But they won't make you smarter.) --98.217.14.211 (talk) 17:12, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

IQ tests are like any other test - if you study for them, you'll do better. That doesn't actually make you more intelligent, just better at the test. If you want to actually improve your intelligence you need to start by defining "intelligence". What would you like be better at? --Tango (talk) 17:15, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

To the OP: Intelligence is a nebulous quality that is really hard to define. Pretty much anything can be taught to anyone; while an individual may have a predisposition to learn some things better than others, that individual can literally "learn" any fact or skill with enough work. And the individual things YOU are good at learning easily are different than the ones that I am good learning easily, so it is very hard to define an overall intelligence for one person. --Jayron32 17:27, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

My only advice is to pursue avenues of discourse that appeal to you. If no such avenues appear, just watch TV, nap, walk, whatever. Something will catch your interest eventually, then just follow along that thread. If you can keep yourself healthy enough in the interim you'll come to treasure troves of insight and wisdom. Vranak (talk) 18:22, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Since we are on the reference desk, how about attempting to answer questions here? Read a question. Search the Internet for an answer. It will require you to quickly learn about this new topic that you previously didn't know about. Being able to provide a valid answer is an indicator that you have formed a very general understanding for the topic. Doing this every day will mean that you will learn a new topic every day. Soon, you'll be one of those annoying know-it-alls. -- kainaw™ 18:33, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Kainaw, I think for once we agree (even if it is about our own superiority). I love the Ref Desk because it lets me constantly engage my noggin' on a variety of topics, not just the ones I am required to think about on a daily basis (or the ones that filter into the newspaper). Engaging earnestly and honestly with new ideas on a regular basis certainly gives one a large well from which to draw from, and while this is not strictly "intelligence" in the sense the IQ testers would like to measure (i.e. an unchangeable raw score of processing capacity), it certainly counts for a lot in our day-to-day interactions with others. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 00:41, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Strictly speaking, you shouldn't be able to improve your IQ (as in "The thing that IQ tests measure") because those tests are supposed to explicitly eliminate things you may have learned and to measure some kind of unchanging innate ability. But if what you want is to simply get smarter - in a general and useful way - then the only way is to exercise your brain. Answering questions here is widely believed to be good for your general intelligence - I know that I learn things (mostly painfully!) every day. I have another Wikipedia-related brain exercise - and that is just before I shut down my PC and head for bed, I always click on the "Random article" button three times and read the three articles that pop up - no matter what they are about. You learn a lot of things that way that you wouldn't have bothered with otherwise...and for some unaccountable reason, you find out a lot about Japanese railway stations! Another way to stretch yourself is to find an article about a subject that interests you and try to make it a featured article. The Mini Moke article is a good example of that. This is a very obscure kind of Jeep-like vehicle that I had a passing interest in - I researched it, investigated, prodded owners, read everything there was to read - and expanded and polished the article until it eventually became the front page lead article. I now own every book and every magazine article ever written about it - and I'm probably one of the world's leading experts on it! So you can both broaden and deepen your knowledge with Random Article and pushing an article to WP:FA status - and you can get better at math/language/science by trying to look up information to answer questions right here - which is probably more of a way to get more attentive to details and to read more widely than you otherwise would. SteveBaker (talk) 19:28, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

coca-cola as a source of edible phosphoric acid for fischer esterification

So I've made some revisions to the idea (all of this is still hypothetical and some of it might not be budget-wise). So basically I want to see what type of flavors I can bring out by encouraging a greater yield of esterification (0.1% yield is satisfactory) during the cooking process by mixing alcohols and organic acids found in food.

I know the concentration of phosphoric acid is pretty dilute, but would it be enough to encourage esterification?

The other thing I can't seem to get straight is acid strength versus H+ concentration (pH). For straight-up acid-catalysed reactions, would you ever have to worry about the type of acid involved as long as some minimum pH was achieved?

Would it also be safe to use reagents like glacial acetic acid (to avoid too much starting water) or oxalic acid as long as you neutralised or diluted the mixture to a safe pH afterwards? After the esterification step is complete, there also isn't any issue with adding sodium hydroxide as a neutralising reagent as long as the pH never rose above 7?

I'm not aiming for one specific product here, just a sort of exploratory thing I could do with a slow-cooker or a frying pan. I know some esterification probably occurs naturally at the ppm or ppb level, but I'm curious what it'd be like if ester concentrations were suddenly much higher. Would there be a way to encourage transesterification via cooking oil? Are there any alcohols other than ethanol that would be safe to ingest in small amounts? (Basically, around the same toxicity as ethanol itself?) John Riemann Soong (talk) 19:20, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, as explained before most acids would catalyse esterification, including phosphoric acid.

The lower the pH the more acid (H+) available, so with a weak acid the equilibrium will be acchieved slower - though even practically neutral compunds (ammonium acetate) act as catalysts too...

You need to consider if the acid itself will reaction in another way, eg an oxidising acid is a problem.. (nitric for instance)

Glacial acetic acid is fairly corrosive, but otherwise not harmful

Oxalic acid is NOT A GOOD idea, not only is it poisonous in itself, it can also decompose into carbon monoxide.

Some alcohols are vaguely the same toxicity eg butanol, but most are more toxic eg methanol, 2propanol, ethanediol. Some are non-toxic eg glycerin.

I'm dubious you will get that far with a frying pan/slow cooker - the alcohols would tend to just evaporate, usually a condensor is used.83.100.250.79 (talk) 19:39, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't want a laboratory-grade yield of esters really -- I imagine that would be really overpowering! I think even 0.1% yield could potentially be problematic (like the food would become too fruity to be edible lol). In a pressure cooker the vapors wouldn't get out, right? Also, I am tempted to let evaporation occur to allow aqueous content to distill... Are there any heavier alcohols that wouldn't be a problem if I just added say, 25-50 mL of them? (n-octanol?) John Riemann Soong (talk) 05:09, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, using a pressure cooker you would be best served if you didn't heat it to the point the pressure release valve goes off..

Octyl acetate is said to be a component of orange flavouring (though limonene and citric acid are also responsible for the smell and taste)

On possibility would be to mix your components in a sealed jar, and wait, maybe a week, then open it and see if the smell has changed.

Where you planning to eat this stuff, or just smell it - because if you don't intend to injest it then sulphuric acid would be a good catalyst.83.100.250.79 (talk) 10:08, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Well I'm trying to make flavored liquids (additives), not perfumes. :p But your mentioning of jars makes me think of pickling -- and esterification takes years in the context of aging of wines. Hmm -- what about a jar kept in the oven at 350 F? John Riemann Soong (talk) 19:51, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

That would probably break or explode if it was sealed, or the liquids would evaporate if not, unless it was some special sort of jar.83.100.250.79 (talk) 11:34, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Why not seal it with fat? I mean, I could let pressure escape in tiny amounts, at the expense of yield. Since fats and oils are also esters -- how would the presence of them affect the reaction? John Riemann Soong (talk) 20:26, 26 July 2009 (UTC) John Riemann Soong (talk) 20:24, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

What is the toxicity of the conjugate base of phosphoric acid? I know some organophosphates in pesticides are toxic, but H2PO4- in itself isn't toxic, right? John Riemann Soong (talk) 20:29, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Not toxic, but still acid. Phosphates aren't toxic of themselves, phosphites (eg anions from H3PO3) are, see Phosphorous acid 83.100.250.79 (talk) 22:51, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Boobs and Butts

What makes breasts and butts so sexually appealing and attractive to males, evolutionarily speaking? Did the cavemen identify the hottest cavewomen babes as the ones with large breasts and butts? Or is it more of a modern culture phenomenon? If it is indeed somehow triggered by an evolutionary response, I'd postulate it has something to do with larger fatty deposits which may help survival if food was ever scarce...but I am in no position to make any sort of educated guess. Thanks for the responses! --71.117.47.195 (talk) 20:28, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Is your question covered in the article physical attractiveness? I see a section on breast size and on waist-hip ratio. -- kainaw™ 20:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

They're secondary sexual characteristics#In humans. In particular they signal "hey, I'm an adult woman; impress me and I might have sex with you". 87.114.144.52 (talk) 20:55, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

and if you think guys liking the big boo-tay is a modern cultural phenomenon, take a gander(sic) at Mother goddess. 87.114.144.52 (talk) 20:58, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

It's not just males who find it attractive either, I find breasts so hot, but I like small breasts not massive. I have no attraction to butts though, is that a male only thing? I'd be very interested to know if it's just me or if other gay girls don't find arses attractive that much either -- —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.91.128 (talk • contribs)

Beg your pardon, but not all males find butts attractive either (I'm speaking from personal experience here). Also, not all males go with "bigger is better" as far as breasts are concerned -- some of us here (same ones that don't find butts attractive) also prefer medium-sized breasts rather than massive ones. FWiW 146.74.230.113 (talk) 00:58, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I know it is an amazing revelation to some people, but it should be common sense. Some people are like you. Some aren't. So, some people agree that what you find interesting, good, or attractive is interesting, good, or attractive. Others disagree. Therefore, it should be obvious that asking if others agree is very much a waste of time. -- kainaw™ 00:55, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Hold on here, you're both trying to paint me in a very bad light by saying I was generalizing all males with my above post, and implying I have no common sense. I was simply following up from the posts above me which basically stated without exception that most men find breasts and butts sexually appealing. Obviously there are exceptions, that's not a "revelation" to me as Kainaw suggested. Secondly, I DID NOT say that all men find only big breasts attractive. When I said "I find breasts so hot, but I like small breasts not massive" I was just sharing my preferences, nothing more. Both Kainaw and 146.74.230.113 posts totally misunderstood what I was saying. I was simply asking about the MAJORITY of men (ie most but not all) and if the majority male idea of sexual physical attractiveness differed from the majority gay female idea. I WAS NOT implying anything about men in general, I was asking FOR YOU to post some interesting statistics or surveys or something. Do not try and cast me in this bad light. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.91.128 (talk) 04:39, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't trying to. 98.234.126.251 (talk) 07:11, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Your question is very plainly worded: "I'd be very interested to know if it's just me or..." I answered that question. -- kainaw™ 13:19, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

That’s a good, interesting question. Unfortunately, the physical attractiveness article doesn’t say anything at all about ways in which perceptions of physical attractiveness tend to differ between straight men and lesbians, or between straight women and gay men. I’d be curious to read about whatever such differences there are, too. It’s not surprising that physical attraction among straights would be studied more thoroughly than physical attraction among gays, but you’d think that there would be at least some studies involving gays that could be reported on in that article. That article is a rather good, well-referenced article, so the absence of references to physical attraction studies involving gays unfortunately doesn’t provide much hope of there being much if anything like that out there. Red Act (talk) 08:33, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I just now spent a few minutes (not an exhaustive search, by any means) looking on Google Scholar for studies that compare and contrast physical attractiveness as perceived by straight men vs. lesbians, or as perceived by straight women vs. gay men. Unfortunately, I didn’t find anything that was really what I was looking for. Red Act (talk) 10:46, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

That's a shame because this is such an interesting topic, you'd have thought there would be lots of studies into it by now. Anyway, thanks so much for trying :) -- —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.91.128 (talk) 14:42, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

One of the obvious issues is that since what people find physically attractive varies somewhat from culture to culture, all you'll really show will be the difference between what is generally physically attractive to American (or whatever) heterosexual men and what is generally physically attractive to American lesbian women. Still of interest but not really anywhere near as interesting as the more general question. And until you have a large number of studies from a wide variety of cultures (which would be rather difficult given the lack of tolerance to lesbians in many cultures) you can't really being to look at the more general question Nil Einne (talk) 15:15, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

True, but that’s a limitation that would be true of at least the large majority of the existing studies that are cited by the physical attractiveness article. I think participants in those kinds of studies tend to be local volunteers, which are mainly going to be college students at the university where the study is done. So the subjects are mainly going to be young, from families where the parents also went to college, and overrepresentative of the predominant culture where the university is located. It’s hard to eliminate confounding variables in a study like that, but some results are better than none. Red Act (talk) 18:50, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes but many physical attractiveness studies aren't set up as comparative studies. If your just trying to work out whether a symmetrical face is preferred it's a different. True your only looking at whether symmetrical faces are preferred by the study group, BUT that may be an issue of interest situation. The problem here is you are doing a comparative study but you aren't really comparing lesbians vs heterosexual men but American college lesbians vs heterosexual men (or whatever) and it's easily possible to imagine that the culture that has developed among American college lesbians is different resulting in the different preferences. The different preferences are still of interest but it's not actually as interesting (IMHO) as it sounds first up since you can't really draw any conclusions about whether the preferences are in any way inate to lesbian women/heterosexual men unless you have multiple studies across cultures. (And given that there are still I suspect a lot of unstudies areas involving lesbian women plus I suspect the likely greater difficulty in conduction such a study I'm not surprised if it hasn't been done yet) Nil Einne (talk) 21:30, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Original poster, are you familar with mammary sex? Well, that involves breasts. Full luscious breasts enable a more successful interaction. Similarly with buttocks. More robust buttocks enable better sex, down there. You can drag in concepts like procreation, DNA, genes, etc, but the bottom line is that a well-rounded body in the here and now appeals to a fellow's imagination as to what might, could, should be done with the female in question. It's a terrible business I know. Vranak (talk) 16:08, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I think you’re confusing cause and effect. The reason that mammary sex exists as a category, instead of sex involving rubbing one’s penis in that area that’s opposite the knee (I can’t think of its name), is because mammaries are a secondary sexual characteristic of a body, and the area opposite the knee is not. So mammary sex seems more exciting than sex with the area opposite the knee. Red Act (talk) 18:59, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

All I know is that such activities seem (and therefore are) good in and of themselves. It's been the classical religious position that reproduction is the one and only function of sexuality, so you can be sure that the very opposite is the case. Things that are patently false tend to be repeated ad nauseum, while modest little truths seldom have any advocates because everybody already knows them to be true. Vranak (talk) 03:30, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Are you just being sarcastic here, or are you demonizing religion in general? If the latter, you gotta take your statement back because it's offensive, uncalled for, and also fallacious in and of itself: Just because religion says something, DOES NOT by itself mean that the opposite is the case! If it were so, then the Ten Commandments (which are the basis of all civilized society) would also be false, and this would mean that it's OK for all of us to steal, murder, commit adultery, and slander our neighbors (among other despicable things) as much as we please! BTW, IMHO & FWIW, I don't really think there's a fundamental contradiction between the Book of Genesis and the scientific theory of the Earth's / Solar System's origins, it really depends on how you read Genesis... 98.234.126.251 (talk) 05:44, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

I totally side with Vranak on this one. Vranak’s statement was just a mild exaggeration to make a point. As far as Genesis, if it’s considered logically acceptable to interpret Genesis to actually mean whatever you want it to mean, instead of what it actually says, then it doesn’t really mean anything at all. If you can interpret things however you want to, then for example any of the creation myths can be considered to be “true”. For example, according to the Bakuba, the Earth was originally nothing but water and darkness, and the giant Mbombo created everything else by vomiting them up in two vomits. The first vomit contained the sun, moon and stars, and the second vomit contained everything else, like people and animals. Well, an Earth consisting of nothing but water and darkness is clearly a metaphorical way of describing a lack of existence, in other words, the state of things before the big bang. And the two “vomits” are really just a metaphorical indication of two periods of creation. And since the astronomical objects listed in the first “vomit” (period of creation) really did come into existence before the earthly objects listed in the second “vomit”, the Bakuba clearly completely nailed how everything came into existence! All hail the descendents of Nchienge and Woto! Red Act (talk) 09:59, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

So what you're saying, the Bible has no validity for anything, even as a moral guide to how we should conduct ourselves -- and therefore the Ten Commandments are irrelevant? Man you're dead wrong here! And as far as the different creation myths are concerned (including Genesis, Bakuba, and all the rest), I never said any of them are "true", what I'm saying is, there's a grain of truth to all of them if you look close enough. That's why they're called "creation myths", cause that's what mythology is all about: maybe 5-10% history, and the rest of it symbolism. IMHO, your way of thinking is precisely the reason why so many Americans don't trust science, because so many "scientific experts" like you are actively trying to disprove and discredit all religion, instead of admitting that science and religion are all about different things: science is all about understanding how the natural world around us works (and how we can use it to benefit ourselves), while religion is good as a moral guide for how we should treat other people. One doesn't necessarily exclude the other, is what I'm trying to say. 98.234.126.251 (talk) 00:42, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

parallel people and universes

I've just watched history.com's 'The Universe' season 3 episode 2 and some guy from MIT said that, according to the Heisenburg Uncertainty Principal, a particle can and sometimes must be in two places at once. So he shone a laser through a glass apple and showed how the photons ended up in three places at once. Then he said that if light can do that - so can we, since we are made up of particles. Then they go on to talk about multiverses, multiple dimensions and that we can have copies of ourselves in all these other dimensions. Even that we can have two thoughts at once, and in one universe we would turn left and the in the other universe turn right - at the same time! My question is about the laser experiment - surely this is based on a faulty premise about the photons? Light reflects/refracts/diffuses and the photons are merely spread out across the room rather than being in many places at once?? Sandman30s (talk) 20:48, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

That is the many-worlds interpretation; while popular-science documentaries tend to embiggen its practical consequences a bit, it's not entirely nonsense, even if it is eyewateringly unintuitive. 87.114.144.52 (talk) 20:52, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Your "merely spread out across the room" theory is easily falsified, by Young's double-slit experiment. For two slits, that shows a probability distribution that follows an interference fringe pattern even if you sent the photos or electrons through one at a time - a photon incident at the detector has interfered with itself - even though we know a photon is a discrete thingy that moves around in straight lines (and if there's only one slit that's just how they behave). There just isn't a nice common-sense interpretation of that. Many-world is weird, but competing interpretations often depend on the role of the observer and the wave function collapse (e.g. Copenhagen interpretation), and why looking at things should decide their outcome is pretty darn weird too. 87.114.144.52 (talk) 21:10, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, I'm kinda dubious about the glass apple experiment too - but there is a genuine effect going on here. Particles - and things bigger than particles - can be in a state of "superposition" when they are two things at once. The most famous 'thought experiment' that relates to this is Schrodinger's Cat. The idea being that if a tiny, subatomic quantum event can result in a particle being in two states at once - then if we use the state of that particle to trigger a container of poison gas to open inside an enclosed box with a cat inside - then the 'superposition' of the two particle states results in the gas cylinder being both opened and not opened at the same time - and the cat is both dead and not dead at the same time. When an experimenter opens the box some minutes later, this "superposition" of states goes away and the cat is suddenly either alive or dead - at random.

The physics behind this is incredibly weird and impossible to get your head around. However, there are several different interpretations of what happened when the box was opened. One of those interpretations (called the "Many worlds hypothesis") says that at the moment the initial quantum event caused this 'superposition', the universe split into two identical "parallel universes". In one of those universes, the cat dies - in the other one, it doesn't.

Because these quantum events are happening all the time in insanely large numbers - and each one requires there to be more universes created - there are vastly more parallel universes than there are particles in the universe. Because every random quantum event comes out differently - each universe in turn produces more universes - like an enormous tree with the branches splitting into smaller branches and the smaller ones into yet smaller ones...except that each leaf is a complete universe. There can't be an infinite number of them - but there are one hell of a lot! Because every event turns out BOTH ways - there are indeed universes that are absolutely identical to ours - except that a single hydrogen atom somewhere out in the next galaxy across from ours is a millionth of an inch over to the right. In all of the universes like that, we are thinking the exact same things - carrying out our lives exactly as we are now.

However, if someone were to do something like the Schrodinger cat experiment which has large-scale consequences, there would be a bunch of universes where the animal rights campaigners are picketting the research lab where the cruel experimenters killed a cat - and a bunch of universes where the cat climbed out of the box, clawed the experimenter, had a plate of fish and wandered off completely happily. You can see then how a small change can balloon up into some massive changes - so we'd expect to have universes where the Germans won the second world war - where the giant meteor didn't wipe out the dinosaurs and so on.

BUT - contrary to what the Discovery channel would have your believe - this isn't a universally accepted explanation for what happens when superposition occurs. Many MANY scientists don't like the many-worlds hypothesis...although none of them can yet disprove it. Personally, I find "many worlds" to be a completely compelling explanation. It's much simpler - less contrived - than the other possibilities.

Disturbingly - all of the interpretations have strange outcomes - not one of them seems to be a 'common sense' answer.

SteveBaker (talk) 21:26, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

The many-worlds interpretation denies the reality of the wavefunction collapse that’s part of the standard Copenhagen interpretation. But a photon (or any other particle) being in two different places at once is just a matter of quantum superposition, that is a feature of either interpretation of quantum mechanics. Either way, photons and other particles really can be in two (or more) places at once. It seems very counterintuitive, but that’s just one of several ways that things behave very oddly when you look at things that are small enough. Red Act (talk) 21:29, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I have a long and complicated thought - that really ends in a question - so rather than messing up this thread, I'm going to open a new thread to discuss it. SteveBaker (talk) 23:43, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I think also what the OP is confusing is the very real problem of seperating perception from reality. We believe the universe to work in a manner that our senses tell us it works. For example, that objects can be expected to behave like, well, solid objects which do not simultaneously appear in two places at once, and stuff like that. However, our personal model of the universe is ONLY based on what our senses tell us, and there is no guarantee that this model is correct. It turns our that, based on visions of the universe we can get using very sensitive devices which take a much more accurate look at it than our unaided eyes and ears can, and combined with some very esoteric mathematics, our personal model of the universe is wrong. It works for us, because we deal in a scale where the errors do not show up on a day-to-day basis, but it does turn out that the impression our brain gives us of reality, and how things like objects and energy and waves and all that stuff, REALLY works, is probably wrong. You can use your personal model just fine for anything the average person will EVER encounter in their lives EXCEPT the really small stuff (like what goes on inside of an atom) and the really big stuff (like how the entire universe came into being). At those levels, our personal model breaks down and we need to devise a new model to explain how the universe really works. And that model makes no sense if we try to compare it to our personal model. That doesn't make it wrong, just unsettling if you are attached to that personal model. --Jayron32 21:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

The copenhagen interpretation is still the most popular one among physicists. It is worth noting that this interpretation does not require parallel universes or any role of conciousness which I find pleasing. Dauto (talk) 21:57, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I think the OP is correct that this laser experiment is bullcrap. Some of those photons we see are reflected and some are refracted. There's no superposition of states involved in the light that we observe. If I send a single photon through this apparatus, it's true that it exists in a superposition of various states covering all the possible paths it could take, until I take a measurement (such as having the photon reflect into my eye), at which point the wave function collapses and I see it as coming from either the one place or the other, not both. The reason we see light coming from both places is because there are many photons in the ensemble and some collapse to one state and some to the other, but we can't observe a single photon in two places at once.

Even if we consider the many-worlds interpretation, this experiment doesn't show what it purports to. You observe the photon in one place, and you in some alternate universe observes it in the other. Neither one of you sees it in both places. Rckrone (talk) 22:01, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for all the answers. To me, all this multiverse stuff seems contrived. Scientists talk about a flat universe, but Michio Kaku laughs at that and says that it is slightly curved, but we merely can't see past the curve. It reminds me of the time when humans thought that the earth was flat. It doesn't seem right that scientists come up with all these wild hypotheses without actually obversing our current universe fully first. If we want to assume infinity for a material domain, then we might as well just follow certain religious scriptures which have all the answers for confused scientists. Sandman30s (talk) 08:18, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

It’s impossible to observe our universe fully first. And in a poorly-understood area, it’s helpful to come up with a bunch of hypotheses, so that someone can hopefully figure out experiments that will test the hypotheses. However, in this case, I’ll agree that some of the proposed hypotheses (like in particular the participatory anthropic principle interpretation of QM), don’t seem like much of an improvement over the kind of nonsense people have invented to incorporate in their religions. Red Act (talk) 09:07, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Healthy Weight

Is it possible to have really dense bone mass/ or really dense muscle mass? Is it possible to have an extra amount of calcium in the bones to cause someone's weight to be heavier than other's, but still healthy? I'm 5'4" and 176.6 pounds but i'm not obese, or even really that fat (I have a small layer of fat). I came back from like a 6 hour hike yesterday, and I actually gained 2 pounds, and I ate less then I usually do. I don't work out every day, I don't do bodybuilding, but I consider myself a little muscular, not like I have small muscles, /scrawny/weakling.174.3.103.39 (talk) 21:46, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

And I am male.174.3.103.39 (talk) 21:46, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

It is possible for a person to be healthy with a weight outside a particular metric's norm. However, we are not qualified to diagnose whether you (or any particular individual) are a healthy weight. — Lomn 22:22, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Body mass index is a rough approximation of obesity, used because it's so easy to measure. It works for "normal" people, but for people outside the norm (most notably, those with above-normal muscle mass), it breaks down. The most accurate measure of obesity is body-fat percentage, which is best measured by a professional (doctor or weight-loss specialist). --Carnildo (talk) 01:04, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

It is possible for people to have faulty weighing scales. 86.4.181.14 (talk) 05:57, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

How do wireless led devices work?

Hi, I am looking for some technical information on how LED lighting can be lit up with a wireless button. I want to be able to light up a LED sign without trailing cables, just a wireless button. Any help and advice will be very much appriciated Thank you —Preceding unsigned comment added by Caz2009 (talk • contribs) 22:22, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

If you are talking about those scrolling LED signs - they typically come with an IR remote just like a TV set. Mine even lets you change the text and color of the messages via the remote. If you are talking about LED lighting - then the answer is the same as for any other device that's powered from the household lighting circuit. In such cases you would need something like an X10 (industry standard) widget with an IR remote. The one I have plugs between the light fitting and the bulb (which could be an LED bulb) - and another unit that you can plug in to any wall outlet in your house which is the IR remote control's receiver unit. From that room, you can then turn on and off (and even dim...but probably not with LED lighting) any or all lights that have the X10 widget...you can even turn TV's and most other low-ish power electrical devices. There are also X10 contraptions that you plug a computer or a burglar alarm into that will allow you to activate the X10-connected lights (etc) via the computer - or automatically on some trigger. In my experience, X10 devices are not 100% reliable from all circuits in your house - sometimes you have to pick a different socket to plug the IR remote receiver or PC into in order to make a reliable communication path. SteveBaker (talk) 22:56, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what a "wireless button" is, but are you talking about controlling the device or supplying power to the device? Tonywalton ^Talk 23:22, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

If it's a one-off amateur construction you could take the electronics out of a radio-controlled toy and use it to drive a relay whose contacts control the sign power supply. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 12:38, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Copenhagen interpretation versus many worlds.

In a previous thread - it occurs to me that I don't understand the concept of "wave function collapse" in the context of something like the schrodinger cat experiment...and that may be what leads me to be a strong advocate of the many worlds/parallel universes explanation.

Let's go back to the classic Schrodinger cat thing:

What bothers me (and perhaps you can explain it) is the concept that the wave function "collapses" at the end of the schrodinger thought experiment when the cat-box is opened.

If the scientist opening the box in the schrodinger's cat experiment is not a "special" observer - then surely he just gets entangled in the same superposition as the cat? Why does a human seeing the live/dead-cat cause the state to collapse when the cat sniffing the poison gas (or not) does not? If schrodinger's experiment is valid - and humans are NOT special - then now you have a scientist who is superposed between grieving for his poor dead cat and being elated that it's alive. If the doors of the lab are closed - then why is the scientist in the lab any different from the cat in the box? The cat (evidently) isn't special compared to the cylinder of poison gas? If the scientist isn't special - then he superpositioned for the exact same reason the cat was.

If human observers are "special" then there is a difference and I could understand the wavefunction collapse idea - but I don't think any serious physicists really like the idea that humans are magical.

But if the scientist is on a par with the cat - then the wave function of the cat collapsed in different ways from the perspective of each of the two superpositions of the scientist. Sure - in one of his superpositions, he'll write in his journal that the cat's state collapsed just as he expected it to - and now the cat is definitely alive - but in his other superposition, he writes that the cat's state collapsed and now it's dead. He only THINKS he saw the state collapse because his brain is now entangled into two separate states!

The wave function of cat (and now cat+scientist) has not yet collapsed from the perspective of an outside observer until they look into the lab and see whether the scientist is in tears over his lost cat or not.

If the entangled scientist then picks up the phone to call his wife and convey the news to her about the cat - then she too (and a good part of the telephone network) is now also superposed between cat-dead and cat-not-dead states - if the news of the cat's demise (or not) is published three weeks later in a major national newspaper then the whole of North America is dragged into the superposition.

Well, you get the idea...the ripples and consequences spread out without limit with more and more of the universe getting entangled in a cat-dead/not-dead superposition. Since there could be many people doing quantum superposition cat experimentation - then many, many superpositions are layered on top of each other with everyone and everything soon being superposed in millions or billions of ways.

How does that idea differ from parallel universes? Each superposition 'state' is a separate train of events that doesn't interact with the others until a "collapse" happens - but collapses are not the simplifications of the state tree that the Copenhagen interpretation implies - rather it is merely the illusion of collapse caused by more of the universe getting superposed! We end up with parallel threads of existence that don't interacts - and we might as well use the term "Parallel universes" to describe them...the results are just exactly the same.

SteveBaker (talk) 23:38, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

There is no "understanding", just interpretations. People who believe Copenhagen interpretation also believe - or seem to largely believe - that anything macroscopic (be it a sentient scientist or a mindless photomultiplier) may cause a collapse of the wave-function of a microscopic system just by virtue of coming into an interaction with it. Other interpretations may not or do not require a notion of collapse at all. The summary is found in Interpretation of quantum mechanics. You can then follow the relevant links, but you are probably familiar with most of this stuff anyway. I am not sure this helps; I hope it does :) --Dr Dima (talk) 23:55, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

In the context of cat experiment, one interpretation would be that collapse occurred even before the door was opened, so when the door is opened the cat is either 100% alive or 100% dead. That leaves the question of when or how the collapse occurred. Another interpretation is that the world "branches" , and in one branch the cat is alive (and everyone eventually knows it) and in the other branch the cat is dead (and everyone eventually know the cat was found dead). That leaves the question of (1) why are we always aware of only one branch and (2) why is everyone aware of the same branch. Yet another interpretation is that there is no real superposition, just probabilities of finding a cat dead or alive; but any particular cat is either 100% dead or 100% alive, and never superposed. This interpretation also has its problems, but they are quite technical in their nature. --Dr Dima (talk) 00:05, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

What you're describing is exactly the many-worlds "interpretation". It doesn't postulate a splitting of worlds, it postulates that the wave function evolves according to Schrödinger's equation, which happens to lead to a dynamical splitting of worlds in the way you describe. I'm not a big fan of Schrödinger's cat because it doesn't involve the uncertainty principle and hence really has nothing to do with the difference between classical and quantum physics. It amounts to nothing more than "the cat might be alive or dead, and you'll find out when you look", which you could say just as well in a classical universe. The collapse is a subjective Bayesian probability update, or might as well be. I've previously complained about Schrödinger's cat here and here. One of those was a conversation with you two years ago. :-) Also I think it's worth mentioning again that Bohr didn't believe that the wave function was real or that it collapsed. Bohr's position was that it's meaningless to ask about the reality of the wave function, all that matters about the theory is its experimentally testable predictions. -- BenRG (talk) 00:43, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

First of all it seems like this discussion is more about the possibility of a hidden variable theory than the many-worlds interpretation, but I'll get to that.

That said I think there is some misunderstanding here about the meaning of a wave function in terms of predicting the future behavior of a particle. A wave function is not simply a probability distribution of where a particle definitely is but we aren't sure because we lack the information so far. It's a description of the actual state of the particle and has a more involved effect on where the particle is likely to be in the future. That's kind of vague but here is an example to try to show what I mean. Suppose I set up a double slit and I send a single photon through. At the time when the photon passes through the screen, it's in a superposition of passing through the top slit and passing through the bottom slit. Now suppose I interpreted this to mean that the photon might be at the top and might be at the bottom as far as I know, but is definitely at one or the other. I would expect that there's a 50% chance of the photon behaving as if it was coming from the top slit and a 50% chance of it behaving as if it were coming from the bottom slit. Measuring where on the screen the photon lands after repeated trials would reflect this. The probability distribution would look like a linear combination of the two separate behaviors, and as a result there would be no interferenece pattern. But that's not what happens. The interference pattern that results reflects the entire wave function of the particle as it passed through the screen. If the particle was definitely at the top slit it would somehow have to "know" about the existence of the bottom slit and behave accordingly, which would violate locality. This demonstrates one of the problems that arises with a hidden variable theory. Bell's Theorem forbids the existence of a local hidden variable theory. In other words wave functions or some concept like them are harder to get rid of than you might initially think.Rckrone (talk) 03:28, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm just dumb. I get decoherence now. Rckrone (talk) 04:02, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Human observers are not magical but they are special. They observe things with a HBNIP (High But Not Infinite Probability) of seeing right, then they remember what they saw with a HBNIP of remembering correctly and then they write what they saw with a HBNIP of writing correctly and a HBNIP of what they wrote being read correctly. The wave function never collapses. Instead a part of it gets increasing focus through a cascade of HBNIPs. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 12:32, 24 July 2009 (UTC)