“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
   – Albert Einstein

Ever wondered what the meaning is behind these words?  I have heard it quoted over and over again as if it were scripture written in stone.  Einstein said it, so it must be true.  But why?  Einstein had a back story and a self-imposed competition with another budding field of science in the early 20th century: Quantum Mechanics.

Einstein felt threatened by work in this field.  Everything about it seems unnatural.  Even today it still does, but quantum theories have given very accurate predictions of how things work, and even incorporated Einstein’s general and special relativity (see M-Theory).  In a quantum system, all possible outcomes exist, but at the time an observation is made, the most probable outcome is what we see.  Sounds insane, right?  Contrary to what Einstein said, this is reality.

For example, a recent study duplicated Feynman’s double-slit experiments (livescience.com/19268-quantum-double-slit-experiment-largest-molecules.html), showing how particles act as waves by producing interference patterns.  Rather than particles passing through the slits like solid objects, they produce the patterns through a combination of positive and negative interference.  The interference pattern created is an observation of all possible outcomes.  The particles produce different results each time, but when summed up, produce the interference pattern we observe.  Does this sound insane to you?  It is simply how nature works, by combining all possible outcomes. 

There are always variations, so doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results isn’t insanity; it’s reality!  In fact, this is why in science, results have to be replicated – to show that we can expect the same results with a confidence interval of at least 95%.  This is because we know we will get different results.

Sometimes, a person’s ideals or beliefs may block them from seeing the truth.  This is known as ego.  In Einstein’s case, he viewed quantum theory as a competing field with his studies of relativity, and set out to disprove them.  In one case, known as the EPR experiments, Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen set out in this quest, only to bolster the field of quantum theory.  Dubbed ‘spooky action at distance,’ quantum entanglement was discovered.  It was shown that information (an electron’s spin) was transferred from one particle to another faster than the speed of light.  Since this is impossible according to Einstein, quantum mechanics must have been wrong.  Quantum theory was not wrong.  Today, this has been replicated and measured (to the best precision possible with what we have to measure with) at over 10,000 times the speed of light (livescience.com/27719-quantum-measurement-macro-decoherence.html).  In addition, entanglement is being used to describe what happens in the event horizon of a black hole, where matter and light cannot escape its immense gravitational pull and are literally pulled apart (phys.org/news/2013-03-curtains-black-hole-firewall-paradox.html; sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/03/130306084151.htm).

The moral of the story: Don’t believe everything to be true.  Observe for yourself.  Make your own conclusions.  Be free.  This is exactly how I came up with the Grand Slam Theory of the Omniverse, which proposes that the singularity that produces the Big Bang is part of a bigger system.  Read more about it in my free downloadable white paper on GrandSlamTheory.com.  For updates, fun facts and articles, and news of my upcoming book, follow Omniverse at fb.com/GrandSlamTheory.  And remember, you will always have different results by doing the same thing over and over again.  This is reality.  Enlightenment is the process of tearing down your beliefs and seeing the truth of how the universe works.

Peace, Love, and Information

picture credit: I Fucking Love Science (note that acceleration due to gravity was discovered by Newton several hundred years before Einstein’s theories of general and special relativity – still funny, though)