Physicists Seek Answers to Quantum Correlations

Physicists sent two photons down optical fibers toward different destinations, and found that the photons could instantly sense each other's behavior.

After performing multiple tests on two entangled photons, physicists have yet again found that the photons seem to be communicating faster than the speed of light - at least 100,000 times faster. The researchers hope that their results might encourage theorists to come up with new explanations for the strange quantum mechanical effect. The physicists, led by Nicolas Gisin from the University of Geneva, arranged their experiment by sending two photons down fiber optic cables to detectors in two Swiss villages located 18 km apart. Both photons started in Geneva, with one heading toward Satigny and the other toward Jussy. The study, which is published in Nature, builds on previous tests published a few months ago in Physical Review Letters.

When the researchers measured several properties of each photon at its destination, they found that the particles could instantly sense the other´s behavior without any known communication. Although this correlation obeys the laws of quantum mechanics, it seems to defy the nature of space and time, at least from humans´ everyday perspectives.

The physicists ruled out several possible classical explanations for the instantaneous communication. For one thing, they showed that the photons did not share information before leaving Geneva, and so they didn´t travel knowing about each other´s properties.

In another test, the scientists showed that no communication could have occurred through a different reference frame, as might happen because of the photons´ high speeds. According to Einstein´s theory of relativity, observers moving at high speeds can get different measurements of the same event because they have different reference frames. But, by performing tests over a complete rotation of the Earth, the researchers ruled out this possibility.

For now, Gisin´s team doesn´t have a good explanation as to how the seemingly instant correlations happen. Even though it doesn´t make sense to them, they hope that others might one day find a better understanding.

In a Nature News story, theorist Terence Rudolph at Imperial College London suggested that humans think that the three dimensions of space and one dimension of time that we´re used to should be the same everywhere, on all scales. But, he says, some things in quantum mechanics might transcend our view of space-time, and we just don´t get to see the whole picture.

"We think space and time are important because that´s the kind of monkeys we are," he said.

More information: Salart, D., Baas, A., Branciard, C., Gisin, N. & Zbinden, H. Nature, 454, 861-864 (2008).

One theory that takes some getting used to is that space and time are essentially the same thing. This means if you function like we do, time seems to be linear, and space has distance.

However, if *either* space or time are different for you, or don’t even affect you, then time and space will be very different, at least from your point of view, as it were.

It has been theorized that all matter and energy is just a single field, that is “out of time”. Therefore it can exist in a multitude of places and in different states simultaneously, at least from our point of view. When it clusters together, it appears to form increasingly immense super-clusters with radically different compositions.

Everything in the universe is just endless iterations of a single field, from our point of view. From its point of view, it is just one.

A vast number of iterations of this single field would be needed to even create a subatomic particle. On a grand scale, there are mathematically optimal stable configurations that form the organizational patterns of our universe, for example. Beyond a certain size, patterns are dependent on these configurations for stability. For example, the triangle and the sphere. They “last” longer, whereas other configurations are less stable and break up.

So, this being said, look at our “matched pair” of photons. In truth, all photons are “matched” to each other in complex stable configuration, but these two are identical twins. Mirror images, and importantly, they may be the same photon. From their “point of view” they occupy the same space and time, even if they are a billion miles apart, from our “point of view”.

This is how they achieve “spooky action at a distance”. Because they are the same photon, just with a different space and time from ours. If “they” are in reality “it”, than when we change “it”, “they” both appear to change at the same time. They don’t have to communicate with each other, because they are the same thing.

Importantly, this also implies that photons have some degree of individuality. Otherwise, when a single photon was changed, every other photon in the universe would also change, and not just its matched pair.

Who knows? Perhaps when we change the spin of a photon, it also changes the spin of a quadrillion quadrillion other photons in the universe. But we only see the change in the photon twin we are watching.

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