Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. Why, exactly, can you not know both the velocity and position of a particle?

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Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. Why, exactly, can you not know both the velocity and position of a particle?

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There are already a lot of good explanations for rationale as to why this occurs, but just to add a bit of info for the interested: this is not at all a property inherent to quantum mechanics specifically and it is not limited to position and momentum. In a mathematical system that operates like quantum mechanics (a wave like system let’s say) you will see this type of property arise between any set of quantities that are related in the same way as position and momentum (non commutative operators).

That was one of the most mind blowing things to me when I took quantum mechanics. It seems like when you really look at the background of these common interesting facts, there’s always some really cool background to it.

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