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Equation 12 · Part 2 · Decoherence: The Quiet Selection That Makes the World Look Solid

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Δx≈10−3\Delta x \approx 10^{-3}
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What this part means

Approximately equal to; the equality is not exact.

Its job in the formula

Approximately equal to; the equality is not exact.

The passage around this formula

Reading a decoherence time off this table only requires the exponent above: a superposition separated by Δ\Delta x decays with a characteristic time t ∼\sim 1/(Λ\Lambda\, Δ\Delta x2x^2) . Take the largest grain delocalized over roughly its own diameter, Δ\Delta x ≈\approx 10^{-3} centimetres, and the numbers in the first column turn into times measured in seconds only in the single, almost pathologically clean case of the cosmic background radiation acting alone — about one second. Every other row is not a slower version of the same story; it is a different order of magnitude of story entirely. Ordinary air brings that same superposition down to roughly 10^{-30} seconds, and a superposition…

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A variable is a named place for a value. Its letter is a local label: x can mean position in one formula and a data point in another.

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