MERRY-PRANKSTER PHYSICISTS

Trying To Draw A Line From LSD To ESP By Way Of
Quantum Physics. Hey, It Was The '70s.

Among the many people in San Francisco taking drugs in the early 1970s
were members of a maverick group of Berkeley physicists who called
themselves the Fundamental Fysiks Group. The young scientists dabbled
in mind-altering drugs as they searched for a quantum-physics-based
explanation for such phenomena as telepathy and extrasensory
perception. The scientific basis for this quest was the experimental
confirmation that once two quantum entities (such as electrons) have
interacted with one another, they remain connected by what Einstein
called "spooky action at a distance." The connection is technically
known as entanglement; if one of the entities is prodded, the other
one jumps.

As David Kaiser deftly spells out in "How the Hippies Saved Physics,"
these physicists based their work on good science, however drug-fogged
were their aims. Entanglement is at the heart of today's uncrackable
quantum encryption; it makes the "teleporting" of particles over
distances of several miles feasible; and entanglement may soon be
employed in the production of quantum computers that will make the
best contemporary computer look like an abacus.

The effort to harness entanglement is in itself a story worth telling,
and Mr. Kaiser tells it very well. But the science is almost secondary
to the book's main focus, a romantic tale of these hippie physicists'
role in the quantum revolution. No wonder Mr. Kaiser was drawn to the
story: It's rare to find quantum physics mentioned in the same breath
with sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, plus religion (of a sort), shady
(but strictly speaking, legal) financial dealings involving a research
foundation that spent most of its money on fees for its officers, and
a fugitive murderer (a leading member of the group who killed his
girlfriend, went on the lam and was convicted in absentia).

I heartily enjoyed "How the Hippies Saved Physics," even if readers
should take some of its assertions with a pinch of salt. Why? Because,
alas, the countercultural scientists' influence on mainstream physics
was not as great as Mr. Kaiser would have us believe.

The key developments in what has been described as the "quantum
revival" were made by sober scientists working in conventional
laboratories far removed in both space and time from the psychedelia
of early-1970s Berkeley. But the hippie-physicists did play two
important roles that are not always appreciated as they should be.

First, the young scientists reached a huge popular audience in the
1970s with books such as Jack Sarfatti's "Space-Time and Beyond,"
Fritjof Capra's "The Tao of Physics" and Gary Zukav's "The Dancing Wu
Li Masters." Linking physics with Eastern mysticism and
parapsychology, these books struck a chord and introduced a whole
generation to the mysteries of quantum mechanics. Particularly in the
United States, universities in the second half of the decade found
students clamoring for courses on topics such as "The Zen of Physics,"
and even if some of the courses (and books) were more flaky than
others, physics students did learn about fundamental developments at
the cutting edge of research.

But the hippie physicists played an even more important role by taking
a maverick approach to the one question that everyone asks upon first
encountering the idea of entanglement: Can it be used to send signals
faster than light?

According to Einstein's theories of relativity, the answer must be
no-useful information simply cannot be transmitted faster than light.

By the 1970s, the matter was settled in the minds of most physicists,
who knew that experimental data backed up Einstein. But the hippie
group looked for loopholes.

The physicists wrote scientific papers with cunning schemes describing
how such "superluminal signaling" might work. Mainstream physicists,
irritated but intrigued, had to find the flaws in their scruffy
colleagues' arguments, refining their own ideas about quantum reality
along the way. This process bounced backward and forward for years.

Every possibility for superluminal signaling proposed by the mavericks
was knocked down-eventually. But the improved understanding of
quantum mechanics that resulted led directly to the development of
quantum cryptography. By eliminating what was not possible, physicists
had been left, like Sherlock Holmes, with a kernel of what was
possible, however improbable it seemed.

Mr. Kaiser makes a neat analogy with the way, in the 19th century,
people would try to invent perpetual-motion machines.

In trying to explain why perpetual-motion machines could not work,
physicists were led to a deeper understanding of physics, one that
became a foundation of thermodynamics. The moral is that it is always
useful to have a few mavericks prodding away at the fringes of science
to keep folks on their toes.

As for quantum cryptography, it has been making steady advances since
the day in 2004 when it was employed for a secure communications
channel in a financial transaction between a major bank and the
Viennese City Hall. Similar signals have been tested using wireless
transmissions over a distance of about 100 miles, sufficient for them
to be bounced off Earth-orbiting communications satellites in the future.

Before long, the Internet is likely to be using quantum cryptography,
making it impossible for hackers to intercept your credit-card details
when you make a purchase.

Articles about quantum physics now appear on newspaper business pages
as well is in Scientific American.

But spare a thought for the poor hippies.

Their dream of explaining parapsychology by quantum mechanics has not
come true, not least because experiments they initiated have found no
evidence for ESP. Bummer.

- - Mr. Gribbin is a visiting fellow in astronomy at the University of
Sussex and the author of "In Search of Schrodinger's Cat" (Bantam).