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The Uncertainty Principle, which says that more than one aspect of a particle cannot be measured simultaneously, illustrates one of several major differences between quantum physics and classical physics. This idea, first presented by Heisenberg, takes into account that a miniscule bit of material can be either a particle or a wave, depending on the circumstance.

Actually, it is neither, until someone looks at it or an experiment forces it to pick sides. This means that a number of qualities aren't defined. If a scientist measures the speed of a particle, for instance, he can't measure position very accurately; it's as though quantifying one aspect puts the other aspects more out of focus. Physicists know this and try to compensate for it in their experiments. Still, the word "uncertainty" is there for a reason. Some physicists say this is not a principle at all and instead prefer to call the concept "uncertainty relations".

Qmechanic
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Sushant23
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    And your question is? – ACuriousMind Nov 20 '14 at 13:04
  • My question is the title itself. – Sushant23 Nov 20 '14 at 13:09
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    I don't understand the question. The uncertainty principle is not a vague statement like "We cannot be sure about anything", but a precise statement about the variances of non-commuting operators, of which we can be certain. – ACuriousMind Nov 20 '14 at 13:16
  • I do agree with #ACuriousMind. But it is not prooved till a Scientist tries to prove it or use it in an expeiment ("it" refers to the system under consideration) – Sushant23 Nov 20 '14 at 13:21
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    See my answer here, the uncertainty principle is a precise consequence of Fourier decomposition, there is even a purely classical analogue of it. – Hypnosifl Nov 20 '14 at 13:21
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    This is not a physics question: it's a philosophy question, and a rather uneducated one at that. – Carl Witthoft Nov 20 '14 at 13:29
  • also, the "uncertainty principle" is a misnomer. The German original term "Unschärferelation" is probably better, it means "blurring relation" and just refers to the fact that the distributions cannot both be arbitrarily sharp. – Martin Nov 20 '14 at 13:34
  • Seems like a vague diatribe about the nature of quantum mechanics, void of a question. – Sean Nov 20 '14 at 14:20

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The uncertainty of something is a quantitative value. It is a number. The uncertainty principle is more named after this value of the uncertainty of a measurement because it is a relation between the uncertainty of two quantities. It is not named based on a lack of understanding. We could just as easily have called it something like the "Error Principle" or the "Variance Principle" or the "Precision Principle" or simply the "Heisenberg Principle". It's just a name that identifies a mathematical relation between the maximum precision of two measurements.

Jim
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One thing that we can be 'certain' about is zero point energy in, for example, vibrations of atoms and molecules, which has been observed experimentally and is caused by the uncertainty principle.

So we can be certain and experimentally verify that the uncertainty principle is correct and that the theory which includes it is correct - is this helpful?

tom
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