I’m not into mysticism. I’ve always strongly identified with the more scientific-minded.

However, recognizing that, as one who’s not really math-minded or much interested in contaminating my mind in that way, it’s easy to see how the structure of the supposed impartiality of math is used in “objective” fields to impose and reify pre-existing prejudices. The “science” of economics is mostly bogus* math masquerading as objective truth, for instance.

It must have been a real blow to the “everything can be understood tidily in a neat system of simple equations” crowd then when quantum entanglement was discovered. (Yes, I know about Einstein’s “spooky action at a distance,” but that must have been just the tip of a massive iceberg.)

For instance, take a look at this description from Wikipedia:

The above result may or may not be perceived as surprising. A classical system would display the same property, and a hidden variable theory (see below) would certainly be required to do so, based on conservation of angular momentum in classical and quantum mechanics alike. The difference is that a classical system has definite values for all the observables all along while the quantum system does not. In a sense to be discussed below, the quantum system considered here seems to acquire a probability distribution for the outcome of a measurement of the spin along any axis of the other particle upon measurement of the first particle. This probability distribution is in general different from what it would be without measurement of the first particle. This may certainly be perceived as surprising in the case of spatially separated entangled particles.

You can tell this fundamentally bothers the math-brained people from this description alone. “May or may not be perceived as surprising” and then a bunch of weird equivocating.

Unless one wishes to posit some method of faster-than-light signaling (for which there is no evidence, and much evidence against) well yeah, I’d say it’s pretty darn surprising.

I’m not saying quantum entanglement and that the fact that electrons have memory can never be explained mathematically (though I personally doubt it), or that there is some mystical explanation — rather that Hamlet’s admonition to Horatio is for the most part as true in the “hard” fields as it is in the soft ones: more things in heaven and earth and all that.

I’m not interested in pseudoscience or mysticism at all, except sociologically. Physics is remarkable in that we know so very much about the universe. However, don’t let the math-brained con you into believing that their systems of understanding are that predictive about very much. They simply are not and probably never will be.

See the above about how we don’t have any fundamental understanding at all about some pretty basic features of our universe and likely never will.

Yes, I know quantum entanglement can’t be used to pass information, yadda yadda, so it has no real impact on causality, blah blah, but it’s one area that makes me laugh because it’s clear that something completely bizarre is going on and physicists’ minds glitch when they contemplate it. For that matter, most math-brained people have mental glitches when try to to contemplate something that can’t be neatly systematized (and then they try to do it anyway, and then pronounce it truth.)

*Yes, the economists have equations that work out. Cool. I’ve even worked out some of them myself. But the models having anything to do with reality? Nope.