Horizon (BBC2, Monday) asked, ‘What is reality?’ and didn’t really have an answer.
Horizon (BBC2, Monday) asked, ‘What is reality?’ and didn’t really have an answer. Well, it seems nobody does, though plenty of physicists, mathematicians and astronomers are working on it. As the voiceover told us, ‘Once you have entered their reality, your reality may never look the same.’ You can say that again. It appears that quantum particles can literally be in two places at the same time. But we are made up of quantum particles, and we are never in two places at the same time, even if that would occasionally be useful. So maybe there are more of us, all made up of the same particles but doing different things in different places. Possibly infinite numbers of us.
It was brave of the BBC. Particle physics, unlike cookery and wildlife, is not a natural for television. For a start, apart from chaps in beards, there isn’t much to look at, so we had lots of squiggles on blackboards, plus persons walking slowly and significantly across the Millennium Bridge.
Comments
Join the debate for just $5 for 3 months
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for $5.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just $5 for 3 monthsAlready a subscriber? Log in