8 Super Simple Ways To Explain Complicated Science

5. The Uncertainty Principle = Blurry Photographs

The Tricky Bit Heisenberg's uncertainty principle describes the fundamental limit to the precision at which we can measure certain properties of quantum particles. There are certain pairs of physical properties that a particle has, such as position and momentum, that are known as complementary variables, that can not be known simultaneously with 100% precision. Heisenberg proposed that that the more precisely we can determine the position of a particle, the degree of precision with which we can know its momentum is relatively less and vice versa. The Simpler Way A simpler analogy for this is to consider the shutter speed on a camera. If, say, you throw a cat in the air and take a picture with a very fast shutter speed, you will get a lovely crisp image of a p*ssed off cat. You will be able to tell from this picture, the exact position of the cat, but you will not be able to tell the direction or speed at which the cat is moving. If you throw the cat again and take a picture with a very slow shutter speed, you will end up with a fluffy blur. From this picture, you will be able to tell whether the cat is going up or down and how fast, but you will not be able to pinpoint the cat's exact position in the photograph. You obviously can't take a picture with both a fast and slow shutter speed, because these are two opposing values. The more you increase one value, the more the other decreases.