What is Quantum Superposition? Explained Simply. Particles Multiple Places at Once?

The video explains the concept of superposition in quantum mechanics and the role of measurement in determining outcomes.
So what does superposition really mean? first, you have to understand that the math of quantum mechanics does not describe the universe. It describes what we might get if we make a measurement. In other words, the math describes the possibility of a quantum object being at any of several positions, at some time in the future. This does not mean that the object is in all those positions now. Quantum theory describes the potential outcomes of our measurements. Before a measurement is made, there is no outcome. It does not describe the reality of the present. Once you make a measurement, you will find the object in only a single location. Actual measurements have never found it at a second location or multiple locations at the same time. That not only does not happen, it cannot happen.

[A_Stereotypical_Heretic]

But superposition is sorta real. The problem is that people love to think of particles as tiny spheres, or some infinitesimally small point, but of course, theyre waves. The only point that exists when it comes to particles is the point in a field where the excitation occurs, and the excitation propagates in all directions as a wave form. So they actually do exist in multiple places at once...think of the ripples in a body of water when one drops a pebble into it, imagine those ripples as the particles wave form. Of course that's a 2d representation of a 3d phenomena so we have to imagine those ripples traveling in all directions in space. When we measure, we are interacting at a point along that wave, which tells us the information we wanted to know about what caused that wave. This is called interference. Think of those ripples, and think of dropping another pebble near them, and those waves collide at a point, which when instigated by an observer is nothing more than what is called a measurement.

[tresajessygeorge]

Isn't that what we say in layman's language :
PRAPANCHAM is INFINITE and Everything in it is finitely infinite...!!!
THANK YOU... DR. ASH...!!!

[mikkel]

It is inherently uncertain at what point in time a measurement is defined.

[James-lljb]

Actually recent experiment determined it DOES mean the object IS "at all those positions now"! Not multiple possibilities, but actual multiple objects in existence!

[filmhaltig]

Talking about quantum phenomena, I can recommend the game Outer Wilds ::)

[noelstarchild]

To go along with this is the question "what makes the weak force weak?" The answer fits right in with this upload.

[lastchance]

The whole of quantum mechanics comes down to the measurement problem. Before quantum objects actually interract with the world, they are nebulous and undefined in position and momentum. But they are still "there" and not somewhere else.

[johnrichardson]

This is why I don't get all the many worlds hocus pocus. When you flip a coin, you don't assume that the world splits into a heads world and a tails world. At least, you don't if you're not David Lewis. The more I learn about this, the more the "wave" function sounds like a probability distribution.

[GyroSportFlying]

Best calculated guess of possibilities.

[watamatafoyu]

The whole probabilistic thing is a nice illusion for us based on our mechanical view of things. Really, I just look at the fundamentals as wobbles.

[quique]

The Universe is aleatory until we make a prediction but that prediction is a probability 🤯

[WideCuriosity]

If it isn't in all locations when a measurement hasn't been made, it must surely actually be in one, but shifting all the time. Does it move, or does it cease to be in one place and appear instantaneously in another ? How does that understanding fit with the idea of space and time being emergent illusions ?

[thokling]

Because the technological capability of measuring such tiny distances is limited, this quantum mechanics dogma is simply random misalignments of detectors falling haphazardly around the point to be tested.

I suspect there's also a hint of acknowledgement in QM that the infinite nature of measuring EM means it may ultimately only be describable in its full as a transform function (Fourier, etc.).

[radinelaj]

Where do we apply it ? What we need it?

[petevenuti]

The wildest part about this quantum fuzziness, is how what's really there is non-local, it's only the interaction that we perceive as particles or things of our existence, it's only the interaction we can know.
Another words, quantum uncertainty isn't a problem with an efficiency of measurement it is a fundamental property of existence, in that things have no concrete existence until they interact with something else.

[teliserd]

One electron is able to move through two slits at the same time, and it self-interacts to give an interference patten. This is real, as long as we do not measure which slit it moves through. So it is not as easy as presented here

[TheOtherSteel]

Off-topic: In written quantum equations, I usually see the psi symbol, but I've never seen the values those psi symbols represent. Is there any way you can show an example here on YouTube?

[dustinswatsons]

Any subatomic particles not bound to any nuclei are unbound particles like the neutrino like the dark matter just like the dark energy too can't really know what you cant see.. but please just don't call it bull crap

[MrBollocks]

Physicists talk about Quantum Physics in superposition.
They are all over the place.
One moment, they are in 2 places at once, the next...😢

[chemistryclass]

But in general relativity theory you said that where is the curve of super position is it also at multiple positions there is no such thing like super position in general relativity theory please correct us