Experiments prove that photons and electrons behave as waves. Experiments also prove that they behave as particles. Imagine firing a stream of photons (light) or electrons at two slits, very close together in a screen. You’ll find that, over a period of time, they build up a wave-type interference pattern on a second screen behind the first. But quantum theory says that, if you try to detect which slit a particular photon or electron goes through, they will instead build up a particle-type pattern. You simply can’t keep the wave-type pattern and know which way each photon or electron went. Very odd.
We’re photons and electrons,
We pop up everywhere;
You think of us as particles
And waves, but we don’t care.
When we’re moving in large numbers
Your predictions of our flow
As current, or as light beams,
Aren’t bad, as such things go.
But you cannot track us singly
Through slits onto a screen:
You can’t detect which slit we use
Or tell where we have been.
You claim your maths explains us,
And yet it is not so.
We’re aspects of reality
That you can never know.
Your paradigms are faulty,
Your theories are all duff;
Herr Schrödinger’s equations,
Though good, aren’t good enough.
Such sorry facts should highlight
The limits of your brain.
Just leave it to evolve a bit
Before you try again!