上海宏润博源学校10年级化学高级班上学期学习了原子结构和量子理论的一些内容。老师布置的寒假作业是阅读刘慈欣的科幻小说《球状闪电》，结合学过的内容聊聊这篇小说中运用的科学理论，写一篇英文读后感。

10年级2班的许同学对《球状闪电》中应用的量子物理学很感兴趣，查阅了很多资料，向我们解释了波粒二象性的奇妙之处，另外也阐述了化学课上学过的氢原子的能级跃迁理论。正如我们的小作者所说，“《球状闪电》里面蕴含了很多科学知识。海洋是浩瀚的，但是科学更加广阔，因为科学探索是无止境的。真理就像一朵量子态的玫瑰花，时而隐匿，时而显现，等待着一个幸运儿去发现她。对真理的探索和追逐真的是奇妙浪漫啊!”字里行间可以看到小作者对科学探索的浓厚兴趣。许同学，我们为你点赞!

《球状闪电》

On Quantum Physics in Ball Lightning

I spent two days reading Cixin Liu’s “Ball Lightning” this winter holiday. It was really a fantastic science fiction and I was very interested in the quantum physics that was mentioned in this book. So I looked up a lot of relevant information. And today I want to put all the things together to express what I have learnt.

During the experimental stage of ball lightening, it is mentioned that ball lightning can resonate with some specific substances. During the process of energy transfer, substances that receive energy will transfer their states from particle to wave. And this episode involves a famous theory that is call wave-particle duality. This theory originally applied only to microscopic quantum fields. But now it is used in the macro world. The substances that receive energy first transfer their stage from particles to waves and then resonate with ball lightning in the form of waves. After receiving energy from ball lightning, these substances will then transfer their stages from waves back to particles. This is what called “macro wave-particle duality”.

Wave-particle duality was not presented by one person. It was the collection of many scientists’ thoughts in history. The reason why this theory was presented is that neither the wave theory nor the particle theory alone can explain the properties of particles in the microscopic quantum field. However, when the two theories are combined, everything can be explained. So wave-particle duality is a necessary product. Moreover, scientists in Switzerland successfully captured a photograph in which wave-particle duality was showed in the light in 2015.

Even more exciting and confusing is what follows. After receiving energy from ball lightning, these substances will transfer into quantum states and have quantum effects. If there is no observer, then they are going to be in superposition states. It means that they are both existent and destroyed. But once the observers appear, the superposition state will collapse to a single intrinsic state. In other words, as soon as the observers appear, substances will collapse from a cloud of probability into the reality we experience. It may be hard to understand, so I’m going to cite a very famous thought experiment to make this a little bit easier.

In 1935, an Austrian physicist called Erwin Schrödinger did a famous thought experiment called Erwin Schrödinger’s cat. The experiment is described as follows: a cat is locked in a sealed box with a small amount of radioactive material. There are two results. There’s a 50% chance that the radioactive material will decay and the cat will be killed by the poisonous gas released by the radioactive material. On the other hand, there’s also a 50% chance that the radioactive material will not decay and the cat will survive. The key to this thought experiment is that people will never know whether the cat is still alive or not unless they open the sealed box. Before opening the box, the cat is in a superposition state. In other words, it is both alive and dead. This is truly against the general logic of human thinking. But that’s what happens in the micro world. I have mentioned that micro substances have two existence forms: particles and waves. Usually, micro substances exist in a chaotic superposition state of waves; however, once observed, they choose to be particles.

Erwin Schrödinger’s cat is somewhat very similar to the substances that receive energy from ball lightning in Cixin Liu’s Ball Lightning. Both of them apply theories that originally only exist in the micro world to the macro world. This is really a marvelous achievement!

By using the knowledge that I have mentioned above, all the “anomalies” inBall Lightning can now be well explained. In addition, many scientific theories are used too in Cixin Liu’s Ball Lightning. The one that impressed me the most was the energy level transition of macro electrons. This theory (energy level transition) was first put forward by Niels Bohr. It was mentioned in the chemistry class too. However, this theory only applies to hydrogen atoms. For other atoms, this theory is still not perfect. It can’t explain the energy level transition of complex atoms.

In the science fiction, the energy level transition is much more obvious. By charging the macro electrons, they will change their colors. And after that, these macro electrons will release their energy. In the micro world, the same is true for electrons. When electrons move from low energy level to higher energy level, they absorb energy; when electrons move from high energy level to lower energy level, they release energy. This science fiction really contains a lot of scientific knowledge.

The oceans are vast, but science is even broader than the oceans. Science is boundless. It always needs more people to explore. And the truth is just like a quantum rose, sometimes hidden, sometimes arisen, waiting for a lucky child to discover her. How romantic it is!

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