"You can think of this process as a kind of an election poll, if you like. X many people say the electron is at Point A, T many others say it's at Point B, Point C and so on. Probably, as in most polls, there are a lot of 'Don't know' and 'No opinion' votes. But then the election ballots are counted, and all those quantal opinions are instandy converted into a single positive fact. Once the vote is in—or once the observation has been made—there isn't any more 'probability.'
"Consider how this affects what we know about, say, electrons. In more or less that way, all we can say about the electron wave is that there is a certain chance it is here or there or wherever. You can draw a kind of Gaussian curve of the possible locations where it might be, but you don't know where in the curve the damn thing really is. But once we make the actual measurement we're not talking about a wave any more. We're talking about a particle. The wave function collapses. It is therefore certain that the electron is known to be at Point A, and it is no longer possible for it to be at Point B or anywhere else.
"That's where Everett asked his big question:
"'Why is that impossible? Why can't it be at all the points?'
"To put it in a different way: What if the electron is actually at Point A, and actually at the same time also at Point B— but in different universes?
"What if each time some quantum uncertainty is resolved, the universe splits into two identical copies—almost identical; except for that one fact, which is the different position of the electron?
"That's the notion that is called 'the Everett many-universes' interpretation of the quantum theory.
"There are other possible interpretations. The one that most people accepted for a long time was the one that may have come from Niels Bohr. That one is called 'the Copenhagen Interpretation.' It says that there are two realms of'reality,' the small, or quantal, realm, and the big, or classical, realm—and never the twain shall meet. We don't have to worry about quantal reality, in the Copenhagen view, because we can never experience it.
"For me, I do worry about it, and I propose to make you worry about the Everett interpretation, too. It has other names, some of which help to explain it. Some people, like Paul Davies, prefer to call it 'the world-ensemble.' By that Davies means the collection of universes, infinitely large in number and always increasing, each of which differs from the one 'next' to it by a single quantum event.
"Of course, a single quantum event right now wouldn't change much. Our universe is pretty set in its ways, and we almost certainly wouldn't even know that that event had happened. Maybe later on that quantal event might somehow turn out to mean that somebody would be born who otherwise wouldn't, or a war would be won rather than lost—you can imagine all that sort of thing for yourself.
"But, even if we concede that such a thing wouldn't make much difference now, it hasn't always been that way. There were critical times in the history of the universe when a single quantum event might have had big consequences.
"If it had happened in the critical moments around Planck time, when the fundamental values that describe our universe were determined, it could have made so big a difference that in one universe living things like ourselves could develop, while in another no life at all would be possible.
"Perhaps out of all the myriad possible universes, all coexisting and all equally 'real'—there's only one in which life like ours could exist.
"Of course, if so, we know which one that is. It has to be the one we are in—because, otherwise, we wouldn't be alive to be in it.
"What I have just said has a name, too. It is called 'the weak interpretation of the anthropic principle,' and we'll talk more about what that means in our next class."
And while all the aiodoi were rejoicing in the song, one aiodos was singing another song. It was not a rejoicing song. It was not a fearful song, either, because the aiodoi have no need to fear anything . . . but it was a song of concern, and almost ofpity, for certain smallsingers who were acting out the song of the Earthly scientist.
15
For Marco Ramos, the worst thing about the way his world was turning out was not that they were lost. "We weren't going anywhere anyway," he whispered to Daisy Fay, trying to console, "so what difference does it make?"
It wasn't very good consolation. She didn't answer. Worse, she wasn't responding at all—had even turned off her belly screen, so that there was no visible face to scan for feelings on the cherry-colored pumpkin that was all that was left of the woman he loved. Marco sighed. She hadn't done that in a long time; only did when things were so bad for her, inside that metal-jacketed mind, that she could not make herself share. It was, he told himself—not for the first time—a great deal worse for her than for himself. After all, what beautiful woman could stand being eternally trapped in the shape of a Halloween goblin? And Daisy Fay had been so very beautiful. ...
He did the best thing he could think of to do for her. He let her be, and focused his attention on what was going on around him. Things were bad enough there, too—the despondent Turtles locked in their own quarters and refusing communication; the Quintero twins unusually silent; Moon Bunderan almost weeping as she sat beside her Taur. Marco didn't like the way Thrayl was looking, either. The great bull head was drawn in lines of fatigue and unhappiness, and those beautiful bright horns were a sickly gray.
And the captain was in a cold rage of frustration, and taking it out on Moon Bunderan. "Why should we listen to that animal?" he demanded, his beard jutting out accusingly. "I can't set a course without some kind of destination!"
Moon said stubbornly, "Thrayl says we don't have to go to a destination. He says we just have to go and the destination will come to us."
"That," Krake said flatly, "is stupid" He turned to Sork Quintero, sober now and withdrawn. "And what about this funny business with time? What do your lecture chips say about that? How can it be that the old Turde ship registered hundreds of years passing?"
Sork said, "I suppose it has something to do with time dilation." Sork did not sound in the least sure of himself, Marco thought. "Or else," Sork added, "maybe it has to do with the fact that we're in an old universe now—collapsing instead of expanding—maybe time runs backwards here?"
"Time can't run backwards!" Krake said savagely. "Talk sense!"
Marco made that throat-clearing sound before he ventured, "Francis? Maybe we should all listen to some more of those chips, maybe find some explanations there?"
His captain transferred his angry glare to him. "Right! And we'll just hang here in space while we're doing it? Christ, Marco! That might be all right for you and the Turtles, but the rest of us can't handle the radiation seepage that's coming right through the shields."
"Then maybe we should go into wave-drive," Sue-ling Quong put in hesitantly.
"Fine! Going where, exactly?"
Moon Bunderan answered him. "I told you what Thrayl says, Captain. He says that doesn't matter, just so we go."
"And I've told you that that is stupid. ..." And the circular arguments went on and on.
Marco sighed. He glanced at Daisy Fay, still remote in her internal worries and confusions. He reached out and linked one tentacle with hers. She didn't resist, but she didn't respond, either.
A sudden thought struck him. He pondered it for a moment, then said, "Francis, this is getting us nowhere."