The Hive Mind Entanglement

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“If Enlightenment was the salad, Entanglement is the soup”

― Neri Oxman

When looking at the very interesting field of quantum physics there is a phenomenon involving particles known as entanglement that will absolutely make you sit back in your chair and scratch your head. 

Now to be clear I’m not a physicist, but as a layman with a curious mind and some certain critical thinking abilities I’m sure that I, like you, probably find the word entanglement interesting enough to study more about it. Additionally I’m confident that it will cause you to want to continue reading this, probably to see what I’m going to say next, only to then perhaps discover whether or not your guess about my approach on the subject of the word here is similar to my own? 

Whether this revolves around your general curiosity or not, if I’m speaking for myself I’d say that the word itself is interesting enough to make me want to learn about it along with any potential concept that it could be associated with just for the sake of knowledge. Regardless of your reason I feel confident that my best attempt to explain it here involving the context of this article, along with a broader application of it that I want to attempt to explore, will hold your attention. 

So what is it that I’m talking about when I use the word entanglement along with using it in the title of this very article? 

Well the first initial concept of entanglement I want to refer to here involves the term as it relates to the field of quantum physics. 

When looking at this phenomenon in quantum physics when two particles such as a pair of electrons, or photons become entangled they remain connected even when they are separated by vast distances. Einstein himself referred to entanglement as “spooky action at a distance.” 

In my attempt at the simplest example I can try to use here in order to make a comparison of what entanglement is: the behavior of particles that are entangled can sort of be compared to how a dance such as the tango can arise out of the behavior of the particles. In other words, the concept of entanglement arises from the connection of the particles that are entangled. This is also what scientists refer to as an emerging property. 

Basically the change in the state of any particle instantly changes the state of the other when they are entangled. 

To further clarify this with one experiment researchers will use a special type of crystal to generate a couple of entangled particles from one. From this point these particles are then sent to different locations. For the sake of this discussion let’s say that the researchers want to measure and observe the direction the particles are spinning which would either be up or down along the axis of each particle in observation.  

Here before these particles are measured both will be in a state of superposition, or “both spin up” and “spin down” at the same time. (Source: Caltech) 

So as the researchers make the observation of one particle observing the direction of its spin and then they also look at the entangled partner’s spin they will discover that the two particles are correlated. 

In other words, if one particle is spinning up the other may be spinning down. Additionally they could both be in a state of spin