Maint: Why's that?
Jake: Because machines work better when I watch them. I don't have to do anything. Just watch, and they'll run better.
Maint: Yeah, I've had that happen, too.
Jake: It drives some people nuts. Their machine will be acting like crap but I come over and look at it and everything is fine.
Maint: Pretty weird stuff.
Jake: Not really. People used to call it spooks or gremlins. Its actually quantum physics. The Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics states that an event is inseparable from the observer. The act of observation has bearing on the event. They first discovered this when trying to determine if light was a particle or a wave. It would act as a particle when they were observing it as a particle and as a wave when they were looking for a wave. Quantum physicists will tell you that it doesn't work on something as big as our machines, but those things are made of quanta that I am observing.Maint: Crazy. I'm going to have to remember that one for the next time a machine mysteriously starts to work better when I'm around.
Jake: Yeah. Just tell them that it's all been explained by post-Copenhagen quantum physics and they need to learn how to watch their machine.
Maint: I guess that makes you a quantum mechanic. Not too many of those around.
2 comments:
You know those Reader's Digest "slice of life" stories people send in? I remember one from several years ago that went something like this:
My VCR wasn't working, so I took it to the electronics repair shop and they said it worked just fine. I got it home and it was broken again. I took it back and the repair man said it was working just fine. Then he took a polaroid of himself, taped it to the inside of the case, and sent it home with me. The VCR has worked fine ever since.
Our car's brakes squeak, but never when in the presence of someone with the know-how to fix them. They've gotten "a clean bill of health" from four different mechanics over the past two years, but sound hideous any time we're more than a mile from a mechanic/garage.
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