Are Particles Theoretically Tangible?

[polymath257]

This is a good way to look at it. Usually, polarization is regarded as a wave phenomenon, but when you realize that it is all about the photons (particles), you start to see the basic quantum strangeness.

But, yes, the wave is a probability wave (well, close--it is a bit more complicated than that) for detection of various 'particle' properties (such as location, momentum, energy, spin, etc).

---

No, it is not a transformation. Our measurement determines what sort of properties we will detect.

The closest intuition is that the wave gives the probability of detecting a particle.

The remarkable thing is that *all* quantum sized 'things' have this dual property, whether they be electrons, photons, neutrinos, quarks, protons, neutrons, or even atoms (although the wavelengths are much shorter). All are 'probability waves of detecting a particle'.

An electron microscope is based on the wave properties of electrons, for example.

So when a particle behaves like a wave, it’s simply moving so quickly that we can’t detect it at a specific given point?

Does this mean that it’s theoretically possible that things we once thought were waves (like light) might actually be composed of super fast moving particles? If this can be true of light can it be true of other forms of energy?

No, it doesn't mean that. This is true of even 'slow moving' particles (those with low momentum).

it means that particles do not have *definite positions*. In your idea of 'fast moving particles', those particles would still have definite positions at each time. But this is *precisely* where quantum mechanics gets strange.

The wave gives the *probability* of detecting a particle in the available positions. Which position will actually be detected is *completely random* subject to that probability distribution.

The particle simply does not *have* a well-defined position (or momentum, or various other properties).

---

No, it is not a transformation. Our measurement determines what sort of properties we will detect.

I was thinking of the delayed choice experiments:

Wikipedia -- Wheeler's delayed-choice experiment

The biggest problem, frankly, with interpreting quantum mechanics is that people try to understand it with classical concepts. But that is getting things *exactly backward*. We understand the *old* concepts in terms of the *new*, not the new in terms of the old.

In the delayed choice or even quantum eraser experiments, the wave function *always* determines the probabilities for the results. if you set things up so that *another* interaction occurs, you have to follow the wave function through that interaction. And, in cases where interference happens, you can end up with results that look very strange from a classical perspective even if the result is a simple consequence of the quantum description.

There is no 'delayed choice' on whether a particle 'goes through which slit'. The *wave* always goes through both slits. The interaction *after* the slits affects the end result and determines if there is an interference pattern or not.