The received wisdom in quantum physics is that at the deepest levels of reality there are no
actual causes for atomic events. This idea led to the outlandish belief that quantum objects -
indeed reality itself - aren't real unless shaped by human measurement. Einstein mocked this
idea asking whether his bed spread out across his room unless he looked at it. And yet it
remains one of the most influential ideas in science and our culture. In¿Escape from Shadow
Physics Adam Forrest Kay takes up Einstein's torch: reality isn't mysterious or dependent on
human measurement but predictable and independent of us. At the heart of his argument is
groundbreaking research with little drops of oil. These droplets behave as particles do in the
long-overlooked quantum theory of pilot waves crucially they display quantum behaviour while
being described by classical physics. What if the original doubters of our quantum orthodoxy
(not least Einstein himself) were onto something? What if pilot wave theory was right all
along? In that case our whole story of twentieth-century physics is topsy-turvy and we must
give up the idea that reality is simply too weird to grasp. Weird it may still be but a true
understanding of nature now seems within our reach.
