Hi Horace. you write: >Something looks a bit magical about 4 dimensions with the all-4-spins-alike >combinations getting a special treatment, though there is no apparent >physical justification.
Yes, I was hoping four would suffice. It's interesting to me that adding more dimensions drives the number closer to .5, one might profit from considering how to manipulate these "hidden" hidden variables. I don't know how you can pick and choose from the rows though; that seems more arbitrary than the system we're trying to replace. I spent some time yesterday looking for detailed descriptions of the actual instruments used to make these measurements, with limited success. Most QM texts start ( and end ) with math and seem to only vaguely touch on actual experiments. That's the second part of my attack, to start from the experiments themselves rather than the theory as we have been discussing. I have little doubt that the theory is correct, but it's rather like saying that I have no doubt that the Bohr model of the atom is correct. It is, but of course it's not, if you know what I mean. All this to say that I still don't understand the QM meaning of spin. It's clearly a poor choice of words to describe the physical reality, especially if the QM view is correct regarding entanglement. You and I got into a long dicussion earlier about nomenclature concerning GravitoKinetic theory, and I'm sure many list members were wondering why I was so hung up on the words. Well, here's a good example of the kind of confusion that comes from calling something "spin" when the reality is substantially different.... Anyway, if you have any good links about measuring particle spin experimentally, now's the time to break them out. My recollection is that magnets were used in the Aspect experiment(?) and deflection direction determined the handedness of the spin. I also seem to remember that what initially puzzled researchers is that the particles all deflected an equal distance, rather than distribute based on their (random) orientation as they entered the magnet. Right there the 3D spin model as assumed in our discussion fails. K.
