Splash Biography

What is everything, and how does it work? The quantum theory is an enormously successful answer to these ambitious questions, leading to some of the most precise experiments ever conducted, whose results are exactly in agreement with some of the most precise calculations ever made. Despite the enormous successes, the theory is bizarre, utterly defying intuition. Single atoms spread out like ocean waves, things have literally zero size yet still spin, and a switch can be both on and off at the same time. We will discuss at a conceptual level what this theory is and why it is so peculiar. In doing so, we will learn how the universe functions at the most basic level, and what all this implies about the nature of reality. Everyone is welcome.