Erwin Schrödinger (1887-1961) was an Austrian theoretical physicist
who shared the 1933 Nobel Prize for Physics with the British physicist P.A.M. Dirac.
He achieved fame for his contributions to quantum mechanics,
especially the Schrödinger equation
(and Schrödinger's cat thought experiment, translated below).

He wrote : (translated from the German) :

"One can even set up quite ridiculous cases.
A cat is penned up in a steel chamber, along with the following device
(which must be secured against direct interference by the cat).

In a Geiger counter there is a tiny bit of radioactive substance.
So small, that perhaps in the course of the hour one of the atoms decays,
but also, with equal probability, perhaps none;

If it happens, the counter tube discharges,
and through a relay releases a hammer
which shatters a small flask of hydrocyanic acid.

If one left this entire system to itself for an hour,
one would say that the cat still lives if meanwhile no atom has decayed.

The psi-function of the entire system would express this
by having in it the living-and-dead cat (pardon the expression)
mixed or smeared out in equal parts.

It is typical of these cases that an indeterminacy
originally restricted to the atomic domain
becomes transformed into macroscopic indeterminacy,
which can then be resolved by direct observation.

This prevents us from so naively accepting as valid
a "blurred model" for representing reality.

In itself it would not embody anything unclear or contradictory.

There is a difference between a shaky or out-of-focus photograph
and a snapshot of clouds and fog banks."

*

Concerning the concept of "time",
The Schrödinger equation is time reversible, but includes a form of irreversibility,
since the description of a phenomenon can only be made after measurement,
when just one state materializes out of several possibilities:
this breaks the symmetry between past and future,
the stronghold of Classical physics and Relativity theories.
 

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