Comment author: punctumm 12 December 2011 05:15:03AM 1 point [-]

Now, for complicated reasons that we aren't going to go into today - considerations that belong on a higher level of organization than fundamental quantum mechanics, the same way that atoms are more complicated than quarks - there's no simple measuring instrument that can directly tell us the exact amplitudes of each configuration. We can't directly see the program state.

I'm not sure if you cover this in further articles... but it is worth saying:

The amplitudes of each state are not unique... there are more than one (in fact, there are infinitely many) different configurations that get you the same observable probability density, each differing by a phase factor.

Comment author: Bob5 07 May 2008 09:43:59PM 0 points [-]

Eliezer: No doubt I am missing a lot. I have the idea of the wavefunction as a real thing, and I am not advocating a collapse interpretation. I am also uncomfortable with any kind of preferred basis. My idea is that the configuration space of the universe is the classical configuration space, but that its evolution is determined by the wavefunction over the quantum mechanical configuration space (in whatever basis you choose). So a point-particle has a real momentum and a real position, which are not simultaneously measureable. For electromagnetism, the electric and magnetic fields have actual values, which are also not simultaneously measurable. The fields evolve continuously but non-deterministically in accordance with the evolution of the wavefunction. There are still blobs of amplitude in configuration space, but only one point in one of those blobs is the real configuration.

Anonymous: I'll look at your reference to refresh my memory of Bohm. The last I heard, there were problems with relativistic versions of that theory.

Comment author: punctumm 12 December 2011 03:58:37AM 0 points [-]

electric and magnetic fields have actual values, which are also not simultaneously measurable.

Actually, they are the same thing, so if you know one, you know the other... they are definitely NOT conjugate variables (variables that cannot be measured at the same time).