Local Realism, Bell’s Inequality, and T-Shirts: An Entangled Tale | NIST

Local Realism, Bell’s Inequality, and T-Shirts: An Entangled Tale | NIST

Local Realism, Bell’s Inequality, and T-Shirts: An Entangled Tale

For this past Christmas my wife, Rebecca, gave me a T-shirt that says "Quantum mechanics: The dreams stuff is made of." This is an allusion to the book The Dreams That Stuff Is Made Of: The Most Astounding Papers of Quantum Physics—and How They Shook the Scientific World, edited by the late Stephen Hawking. For some time, I hesitated to wear the T-shirt because I found its message to be problematic. My feelings toward this very thoughtful gift have to do with NIST’s experiments in quantum foundations, the world’s most random numbers, and why I happily wear the T-shirt now.

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