On 7/28/2025 4:12 AM, John Clark wrote:
On Sun, Jul 27, 2025 at 9:10 PM Brent Meeker <[email protected]>
wrote:
**
/>>> If it's an unmeasured electron the the chance of UP or
DN could be anything. Maybe it's an UP electron from a
source that only produces UP electrons./
*>> If that is the case then somewhere and sometime in its
lifetime the electron must've encountered something equivalent
to a Stern–Gerlach magnet, and so the electron is
_NOT_ unmeasured. *
/> So if I illuminate a piece of iron with some photons that knock
out electrons via the photoelectric effect, then on passing them
thru an SG magnet and detecting their distribution, you say they
must necessarily be 50/50 UP/DN?/
*Not necessarily. Electrons in magnetic iron are not randomly
oriented, so the electrons knocked out of the iron may have some
preferential spin orientation. Also because angular momentum is
conserved, circularly polarized light can preferentially eject
electrons of one spin orientation over the other. But both the
magnetic orientation of iron atoms and the amount of polarization of
the light are known quantities, at least theoretically, *
What's that supposed to mean, besides "I need it to be right."?
*therefore the electrons they eject cannot be considered "unmeasured"
because sometime somewherethey have encountered something equivalent
to a Stern–Gerlach magnet, just as I said.*
A bit of iron found in the ground is unlikely to have encountered an
SG. I think you're fudging the meaning of "measured" to cover your
error. You've just /defined/ "unmeasured" to mean 50/50 distribution.
What's your definition of "measurement"?
Brent
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