lesliedellow states that Einstein lost the argument over the Uncertainty Theory for the simple reason that he couldn't come up with an alternative or better theory. I think there's more to it, maybe some clever scientific cheating (see below):
In the May 15, 1935 issue of Physical Review Albert Einstein co-authored a paper with his two postdoctoral research associates at the Institute for Advanced Study, Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen entitled “Can Quantum Mechanical Description of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete?” An evolutionist designated this paper as “one of the most important 'wrong' papers in the history of science!”
Although the lead author of the paper, Einstein did not review it before publication. As a result, he immediately objected to the published paper, presenting his own version several times over the years. Perhaps his most concise presentation came out in Schilpp 1949, p. 682:
“[T]he paradox forces us to relinquish one of the following two assertions:
(1) the description by means of the psi-function (or wave equation) is complete
(2) the real states of spatially separate objects are independent of each other.”
In Item 1 above the wave equation was forced to apply probability to individual particles rather than groups. Item 2 would prevent taking two quantum-entangled particles and separating them by a distance. If Item 2 were false, you could manipulate one of these particles into a given state, and the distant one would instantaneously represent that state! Thus, we could have information travel faster-than-the-speed-of-light between the particles. Some have even suggested DNA information traveling in this way, producing a faster-than-light transporter like Scotty used on the Enterprise spaceship.
One glaring weakness in this is… Indeterminism was adopted during a time when physical measuring instruments were significantly larger than the particles being measured. At that time no one could conceive of measuring these tiny particles without ‘banging into them with the instrument’. Since then, many ways have been determined to measure such particles indirectly, so they are not impacted at all by the measurement. So, why is science still accepting a theory that draws its strength from the era of clumsy instruments? Good question.
With such reasonable support for Einstein, how did he lose the debate?
The acclaimed and ‘definitive’ rebuttal of Einstein’s argument was first presented by Bohr. plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-epr/ summarized the weaknesses in Bohr’s rebuttal of EPR (the paper that started this debate; it stands for the first letters of the paper ghosted by Einstein's assistants). “Briefly, at points BOHR APPEARS TO SUPPORT EINSTEIN’S VIEW.”
For decades scientists remained confused about the winner of the debate:
"Even though the Bell theorem does not rule out locality conclusively, IT SHOULD CERTAINLY MAKE ONE WARY of assuming it. On the other hand, since Einstein's exploding gunpowder argument (or Schrödinger's cat) supports incompleteness without assuming locality, ONE SHOULD BE WARY OF ADOPTING THE OTHER HORN OF THE DILLEMMA, affirming that the quantum state descriptions are complete and ‘therefore’ that the theory is nonlocal. It may well turn out that BOTH HORNS NEED TO BE REJECTED: that the state functions do not provide a complete description and that the theory is also nonlocal (although possibly still separable; see Winsberg and Fine 2003)." -- Quoted from “The Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Argument in Quantum Theory,” first published Mon May 10, 2004; substantive revision Wed Aug 5, 2009, also at http:// plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-epr/).
The uncertainty over the debate embarrassed the Quantum Physics Establishment to the point that they posthumously put words into Bohr’s mouth, as evidenced by the following:
“But because Bohr's view on complementarity has wrongly been associated with positivism and subjectivism, much confusion still seems to stick to the Copenhagen interpretation. Don Howard (2004) argues, however, that what is commonly known as the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, regarded as representing a unitary Copenhagen point of view, differs significantly from Bohr's complementarity interpretation. He holds that "the Copenhagen interpretation is an invention of the mid-1950s, for which HEISENBERG IS CHIEFLY RESPONSIBLE, [and that] various other physicists and philosophers, including Bohm, Feyerabend, Hanson, and Popper, hav[e] further PROMOTED THE INVENTION IN THE SERVICE OF THEIR OWN PHILOSOPHICAL AGENDAS." (p. 669) (from
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-copenhagen/)
(Hang on, I truly am going somewhere with this! More than just criticizing Bohr and Heisenberg)
I think it’s time for a round of applause for Einstein, who achieved his intent to make the God he believed in a center of strenuous, scientific debate for 86 years. A debate that not even Einstein himself could solve… making his assertion all the more telling… that His God created a universe full of mysteries in order that we scientists should remain humble in light of them.
Certainly our job is NOT to continue the second greatest indoctrination of the last Century (probabilistic particles in quantum physics) … NOT to keep patching the wilting, hot-air bag of Quantum Mechanics with another questionable assumption… certainly NOT to continue publishing the exulted implications of each assumption (“teleportation, faster-than-light communication”)… AND, perhaps the most compassionate, NOT to keep resurrecting Bohr’s argument posthumously for another patch job (making Bohr say something he never did “in service of their own philosophical agendas”)… Just allow the poor guy at rest-in-peace.
The greater travesty of justice is this: Heisenberg deceitfully erased Einstein’s work for being a deist and therefore his peers for all time could claim that there’s no God in science (by assumption), construing Science to prove there is no God! (that’s circular reasoning, in case you missed it). The real truth is that science NEITHER proves nor disproves God (get over it and let’s go on!)
