Posted by Miguel on January 31, 2004 at 10:58:22
In Reply to: Bell's Theorum posted by AG on January 31, 2004 at 09:39:37:
I problably misunderstood you in the first place but I also didn't do a good job at explaining myself.
What you go over, here, is my comment on the statistical methods, which includes the ecological error you mention, which is the problem of generalization, which is what I was referring at originally. This is pertinent to quantum mechanics because of the statistical methods it uses.
Since Bell's theorem uses its methods, its results can only be applied onto the population (matter as a whole) but not to individual quantic phenomena. What the theorem more or less explains is that two particles, which have had a certain type of interaction (read spin value) will remain linked in such a way that it is possible to know what one of them is doing by measuring the other. The problem of expanding these to other fields is that this theorem is "a fact" only when seen in millions of pairs of particles when the overwhelming statistical result points to that "fact".
In this context, we could agree when we say that "all young people are wild" but would be hard pressed to say that johnny or mary are wild just because they are young. It might not be the case. While the generalization could, might be acceptable up to some point, the individualization is difficult. But this is not Bell's theorem, which only deals with certain types of particles and ONLY at the quantum level.