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Quantum physics may be easily demonstrated using a LCD computer monitor and a pair of polaroid sunglasses. LCD monitors emit polarized light, with the polarization axis generally 45 degrees from the vertical. Like other physical properties, the polarization state does not assume a specific value until a measurement is made, collapsing the wave function. The fact of measurement then effects subsequent events. To demonstrate this, please disassemble the polaroid sunglasses into two separate lenses. Then follow this diagram: The Explanation The LCD screen emits polarized photons. If the polarization is measured as the photons leave the screen, they would show a statistical distribution with its peak at 45 degrees sloping down to zero at right angles from this. Thus, the rotated polaroid filter in the second picture blocks all photons and appears black. Things change when the second polaroid filter is inserted between the LCD screen and the first filter. This second filter, with polarization axis vertical, is able to pass about 25% of the photons emitted by the LCD screen. More importantly, the second filter performs a measurement of the photons. The fact of measurement collapses the wave function, resetting the polarization to a distribution with its peak at vertical sloping to zero at 90 degrees. The photons then proceed to the first filter which again makes a measurement. Because the polarization distribution now peaks at vertical about 25% of the photons may now pass through the first filter. This allows about 6% of the original photons to pass through creating a visible image. As a further experiment, the second lens may be replaced with transparent plastic or glass, or translucent paper. Any substance that performs a measurement will collapse the wave function and relieve the photon blockage caused by the first lens. Why this is astonishing Intuition dictates that a polarizing filter that is blocking all light will continue to block all light if yet another filter, plastic, or glass surface is placed in the photon's path. After all, another layer can only block more photons. This non-intuitiveness illustrates the quantum axiom that there is no objective, outside world with a reality independent of observation and measurement. The observer cannot be separated from the experiment. As Richard Feynman warns us, "Do not keep saying to yourself, if you can possibly avoid it, 'But how can it be like that?' because you will get 'down the drain,' into a blind alley from which nobody has yet escaped. Nobody knows how it can be like that.",
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