{"id":1212,"date":"2025-10-16T18:39:06","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T14:39:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/hub\/?p=1212"},"modified":"2025-10-20T18:51:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-20T14:51:07","slug":"bells-theorem-explained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/hub\/science\/bells-theorem-explained\/","title":{"rendered":"Bell\u2019s Theorem Explained: Spooky Action at a Distance Is Real"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Quantum mechanics has baffled scientists for decades. One of its strangest predictions? Particles can instantly affect each other across vast distances\u2014what Einstein famously called &#8220;spooky action at a distance.&#8221; In 1964, physicist John Bell proved this weirdness is real.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Bell&#8217;s groundbreaking work, explained in Adam Becker&#8217;s <em>What Is Real?<\/em>, transformed abstract philosophical debates into testable experiments. The results shocked the physics world and confirmed that reality operates in ways far stranger than we&#8217;d imagined. Keep reading to learn how Bell&#8217;s theorem changed our understanding of the universe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Image credit: <a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:John_bell_2.png\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">CERN via Wikimedia Commons<\/a> (<a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">License<\/a>). Image cropped<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-yoast-seo-table-of-contents yoast-table-of-contents\"><h2>Table of Contents<\/h2><ul><li><a href=\"#h-what-is-bell-s-theorem\" data-level=\"2\">What Is Bell\u2019s Theorem?<\/a><ul><li><a href=\"#h-the-background-to-the-theorem\" data-level=\"3\">The Background to the Theorem<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#h-how-bell-s-theorem-transforms-philosophy-into-experiment\" data-level=\"3\">How Bell\u2019s Theorem Transforms Philosophy Into Experiment<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><li><a href=\"#h-dive-deeper-into-the-issues-surrounding-bell-s-theorem\" data-level=\"2\">Dive Deeper Into the Issues Surrounding Bell&#8217;s Theorem<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-what-is-bell-s-theorem\">What Is Bell\u2019s Theorem?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Bell\u2019s theorem shows that, if quantum mechanics is correct (and experiments say it is), then reality is fundamentally nonlocal\u2014or at least not governed by any hidden classical mechanism. In his book <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/app\/book\/what-is-real\/preview\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">What Is Real?<\/a><\/em>, astrophysicist Adam Becker explains Bell&#8217;s theorem in the context of a broader debate within quantum mechanics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-the-background-to-the-theorem\">The Background to the Theorem<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Becker lays out a fundamental puzzle: while quantum mechanics describes particles existing in multiple states simultaneously and influencing each other across distances, we don&#8217;t observe these strange behaviors in everyday life. When scientists try to measure quantum systems, the quantum properties vanish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since the 1920s, physicists have debated where and why the rules transition from quantum to classical behavior. According to Becker, most physicists avoided directly solving this problem by adopting the &#8220;Copenhagen interpretation&#8221;\u2014which claims nothing has definite properties until observed, so objective reality only exists through observation. This conveniently explains why we don&#8217;t see quantum weirdness in daily life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, Becker contends the Copenhagen interpretation became dominant, not through rigorous scientific debate, but because alternative explanations were sidelined by political and philosophical influences rather than being fairly evaluated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Despite decades of institutional hostility, the fundamental questions about quantum mechanics\u2019 meaning proved impossible to eliminate. Becker explains that experimental breakthroughs and theoretical innovations gradually rehabilitated foundational research\u2014and revealed that the same questions troubling Einstein and Schr\u00f6dinger remained unresolved, creating ongoing tensions about science\u2019s ultimate purpose and the nature of reality itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-how-bell-s-theorem-transforms-philosophy-into-experiment\">How Bell\u2019s Theorem Transforms Philosophy Into Experiment<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The return to these fundamental questions began in 1964 with John Bell, who was skeptical about a mathematical argument that had supposedly proven the Copenhagen interpretation was the only possible approach to quantum mechanics. This argument was John von Neumann\u2019s 1932 \u201cimpossibility proof,\u201d which claimed to show that no theory with \u201chidden variables,\u201d where particles have definite properties before measurement, could reproduce quantum mechanics\u2019 predictions. As Becker notes,<strong> this seemed to prove that realist positions such as Einstein\u2019s were mathematically impossible<\/strong>: If particles can\u2019t have definite properties before measurement, then only anti-realist interpretations such as Copenhagen could be correct.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But <strong>Bell discovered that von Neumann\u2019s proof was flawed<\/strong>. Bell then reconsidered Einstein\u2019s thought experiment and transformed his philosophical concerns into mathematical tests. Bell reasoned that if particles <em>do<\/em> have definite properties before measurement, then measurements on entangled particles should obey certain mathematical constraints on how strongly correlated the results can be, which became known as \u201cBell\u2019s inequalities.\u201d Quantum mechanics predicts that entangled particles will violate these limits, so this gave physicists a decisive test, and experiments in 1972 and 1982 proved that particles violate Bell\u2019s inequalities. This meant Einstein was right about \u201cspooky action at a distance\u201d being real\u2014but wrong about quantum mechanics being incomplete. <strong>The theory wasn\u2019t missing information; reality really was nonlocal<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table class=\"has-fixed-layout\"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Why Bell Thought Einstein Was Right to Be Worried<\/strong><br><br>For decades, physicists <a href=\"https:\/\/quantumzeitgeist.com\/introduction-to-the-bell-inequality\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">dismissed Einstein\u2019s concerns<\/a> about quantum mechanics by citing von Neumann\u2019s proof. But the proof contained a fatal flaw: It assumed that hidden variables must behave according to a \u201clinearity\u201d rule that sounds reasonable mathematically but <a href=\"https:\/\/ui.adsabs.harvard.edu\/abs\/2004quant.ph..8191R\/abstract\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">makes no physical sense<\/a>. Specifically, von Neumann required that if you could measure two quantum properties A and B separately, then you should also be able to measure their mathematical combination (A + B). But in quantum mechanics, many properties <em>can\u2019t<\/em> be measured simultaneously, so demanding that their combination be measurable is physically meaningless.<br><br>The experiments that proved particles violate Bell\u2019s inequalities showed that particles <em>do<\/em> have some form of objective reality\u2014supporting realism\u2014while confirming that \u201cspooky action at a distance\u201d really exists. This supported Einstein\u2019s concerns about quantum mechanics\u2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/book\/45622\/chapter-abstract\/394864307?redirectedFrom=fulltext\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">disturbing nonlocal implications<\/a>:\u00a0 Locality is fundamental to our spatial understanding of the world\u2014it lets us <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/how-einstein-revealed-the-universe-s-strange-nonlocality\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">identify different locations<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.space.com\/31066-spooky-action-at-a-distance-book-interview.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">treat them as independent<\/a>. Einstein worried that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/the-universe-is-not-locally-real-and-the-physics-nobel-prize-winners-proved-it\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">abandoning locality<\/a> meant abandoning our framework for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.caltech.edu\/about\/news\/proving-that-quantum-entanglement-is-real\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">understanding cause and effect<\/a>. Bell\u2019s theorem proved that reality really is as strange as Einstein feared, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nist.gov\/blogs\/taking-measure\/local-realism-bells-inequality-and-t-shirts-entangled-tale\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">validating his intuition<\/a> that such strangeness deserved serious concern rather than casual acceptance.\u00a0<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Becker explains that Bell\u2019s theorem forced physicists to face a choice: Abandon the principle of locality (and accept the idea of instant connections across space), abandon realism (and accept that properties don\u2019t exist before measurement), or abandon the idea that quantum mechanics is complete. <strong>Three alternative interpretations represent different responses to this choice<\/strong>. They all revolve around the question of what causes <em>wave function collapse<\/em>\u2014the moment when the \u201cprobability wave\u201d of a quantum particle\u2019s potential location and momentum \u201ccollapses\u201d into the specific characteristics it takes on when it\u2019s observed and measured.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-dive-deeper-into-the-issues-surrounding-bell-s-theorem\">Dive Deeper Into the Issues Surrounding Bell&#8217;s Theorem<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Becker effectively positions Bell&#8217;s work as part of the ongoing debate in quantum mechanics. To learn more about the broader context of the theorem, read Shortform&#8217;s full guide to Becker&#8217;s book <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/app\/book\/what-is-real\/preview\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">What Is Real?<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>John Bell&#8217;s work transformed abstract philosophical debates into testable experiments. Learn how his theorem shocked the physics world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":1227,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.3 (Yoast SEO v24.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Bell\u2019s Theorem Explained: Spooky Action at a Distance Is Real - Shortform Hub<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"John Bell&#039;s work transformed abstract philosophical debates into testable experiments. 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