Douglas Adams' "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", or H2G2 as it's known to its fans, is my Bible. Yes I'm one of those people who always plays 42 on the Lottery and have been known to ask barmen if they've got any Old Janx Spirit. I don't know what the H2G2 equivalent of a Trekkie is, but I am probably one. Adams studied English Literature, which becomes evident when he is critiquing Vogon poetry: "the third worse in the Universe. The second worst is that of the Azgoths of Kria. During a recitation by their Poet Master Grunthos the Flatulent of his poem 'Ode To A Small Lump Of Green Putty I Found In My Armpit One Midsummer Morning' four of his audience died of internal haemorrhaging, and the President of the Mid-Galactic Arts Nobbling Council survived by gnawing one of his own legs off."
Say what you like about Douglas Adams, he knows his poetry.
In his seminal meisterwerk, Adams explained obscure mathematical constructs such as the Improbability Drive, the Total Perspective Vortex and the Pangalactic Gargleblaster. He defines an intergalactic measure of speed thus: "R is a velocity measure, defined as a reasonable speed of travel that is consistent with health, mental wellbeing and not being more than say five minutes late. It is therefore clearly an almost infinitely variable figure according to circumstances, since the first two factors vary not only with speed taken as an absolute, but also with awareness of the third factor. Unless handled with tranquillity, this equation can result in considerable stress, ulcers and even death. .... R17 is not a fixed velocity, but it is clearly far too fast."
Adams was not a scientist. All things being equal, it may start to dawn on you, very slowly, that not everything Adams wrote is true.
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The other day I saw this brilliant little film from the California Institute of Technology, CalTech to its friends, for which they had managed to rope in the participation of Sir Stephen Hawking. No idea who the other guy is.
Now I don't mind admitting a lot of this went over my head, so I had to go and do some research. I learned that the word "quantum" comes from the Latin "quantus", meaning "how much". Or, as my late husband The Major was oft heard to exclaim in a tone of incredulity, "HOW MUCH????" Quantum of Solace meant something quite different to dear Harold, especially on the hard shoulder of the motorway on the outskirts of Wroclaw.
My other bible, Wikipedia, had this to say on Quantum Dynamics: "In physics, quantum dynamics is the quantum version of classical dynamics. Quantum dynamics deals with the motions, and energy and momentum exchanges of systems whose behavior is governed by the laws of quantum mechanics."
I am sure we're all the wiser for that piece of information. Now for the science bit. Wiki say about Quantum Mechanics: "(QM; also known as quantum physics or quantum theory) including quantum field theory, is a fundamental branch of physics concerned with processes involving, for example, atoms and photons. In such processes, said to be quantized, the action has been observed to be only in integer multiples of the Planck constant, a physical quantity that is exceedingly, indeed perhaps ultimately, small. This is utterly inexplicable in classical physics."
It occurred to me that there was a degree of similarity to Douglas Adams in such explanations.
I checked out quantum computing and quantum chemistry. I invite you to read any source you can and tell me if it makes any sense at all. Like H2G2, it all SOUNDS very erudite and scientific, but underneath, is there any real substance?
Now I am a world-renowned conspiracy theorist, and my tinfoil hats have won prizes, but there was a pervasive pong of piscine putrefaction starting to assault my delicate nostrils. The more I tried to pin down the elusive quantum, the more nebulous and convoluted the definitions got. Something, to quote Mr Donald, was going on.
A selection of my award-winning tin foil hats
It follows that if you can have quantum mechanics, quantum physics, and quantum computing, you can have quantum medicine, quantum architecture, quantum maths and quantum history. Possibly even quantum cooking, quantum football or quantum swimming. Certainly quantum athletics, since there is such a thing as a Quantum Leap. Quantum table tennis certainly is A Thing, how else do you think they'd have come up with "Pong"?
Anecdote: When I was a bright young thing of 21, in my final exams I disproved Descartes' famous philosophical proposition "Je pense, donc je suis" by dismissing it as a bit of linguistic jiggery-pokery. I can't remember the exact thought processes that possessed me in the exam, but my professor was dead impressed. "Miss Harridan, all this last year I thought you weren't listening!" he exclaimed.
Permit me at this juncture to digress a little and mention a popular game on a BBC radio programme, called "Mornington Crescent". The short description of the rules on Wikipedia says merely: "The game consists of each panellist in turn announcing a landmark or street, most often a tube station on the London Underground system. The apparent aim is to be the first to announce "Mornington Crescent", a station on the Northern Line." This is clearly written by someone from outside of the M25, who has understood nothing of the game. It's a bit like me trying to explain cricket, the reality of which is also open to discussion (see H2G2, "Krikkit"). The subtleties of Mornington Crescent are far too extensive to be pinned down to one paragraph. It is a game in which the possibilities for invention and creativeness are infinite, in the Adamsian sense of infinite, meaning too vast to fit inside the human imagination. It is also totally made up.
After watching the CalTech film, the loud "bong" of a penny dropping into an infinitely deep hole resounded throughout my being, and I started to laugh, and I couldn't stop, because I realized I had understood the principles of quantum theory. They are almost identical to the rules of Mornington Crescent. i.e. you make it up as you go along, using the most obscure references you can think of, comedic titles and an air of knowledgeable superiority. Whatever you do, keep a straight face. A nodding acquaintance with Hawking's A Brief History of Time will help, but ultimately, as the CalTech film says, Anyone Can Quantum. There are hints all around us. None of this is to be taken seriously.
Worth noting that in my edition of "A Brief History of Time", Stephen Hawking points out that the first edition was published on April Fool's Day.
By George, I think I've got it.
The greatest sit-down comedian of all time
