Physics
I think Grandpappy is probably loving advances in modern physics. First of all, I’ll bet it tickles Him to no end that so many really smart people are showing so much interest in what He created. But more important than that, I’m certain He’s getting a kick out of the looks on our faces when we find things we don’t expect.
Take quantum physics, for example. Specifically, consider the infamous "two-slit experiment."
Cut a vertical slit in a partition and shoot a beam of light at it. The shaded wall behind the partition will show a fuzzy bar of light that might give you the impression that light is made up of particles, some of which are bouncing off the partition, but the rest of which are blasting through the slit and scattering onto the wall. Now, cut a second vertical slit in the partition right next to the first, shine the light through and examine the wall behind. You would expect that light, which you’ve just proven is made up of particles, will pass through the two slits and create two glowing oblong splotches on the wall. What you actually see, though, are vertical bands of light separated by bands of shadow. This pattern is what you’d expect from waves traveling through the two slits. This is because when one wave hits two slits in a partition, on the other side of the partition it becomes two waves, one emanating from each slit. Before the two waves reach the wall, they overtake one another and cancel out some of each other’s ripples (a peak from one ripple can combine with the trough of the other, so they both flatten out). So the wall, then, ends up receiving not two waves, but several waves separated by dead spots. So, when there are two slits in the partition, light behaves as if it is a wave. But this suggests that the question of whether or not light is a wave or particles is determined not by an unambiguous, immutable law, but by how we as observers choose to look at it.
About now you’re wondering just what Grandpappy was up to when He thought all this up, arncha?
So you decide to get cute and shoot just one particle at a time at the partition with two slits. Obviously, you’re thinking that when you were just pouring particles onto the partition that perhaps some interaction between them in-transit caused them to figure out the whole wave pattern thing. But one at a time… they’ll just be a bunch of dumb particles and they’ll probably scatter randomly and form two splotches on the wall. (Well, actually you’d place some kind of photographic film on the other side of the partition and expose it over a period of time, but you get the idea.)
But then, sure enough, the particles form wave patterns anyway. It’s almost as if the first particle left the light gun and when it reached the partition it stopped and pulled out its cell phone and said, "Sally? It’s Joe. Yeah, I know I just left, but I’ve got to tell y’all something. Uh-huh. Well, it’s two slits. Two. Yeah, I’m sure I’m hovering right here. One, two. I’d count them on my fingers if I had any. Huh? Oh. Well, no, I guess I never thought about how we use cell phones without fingers, but listen, we need to coordinate this so tell the others we’re doing wave pattern sigma, OK?"
The truth is, nobody’s really certain why the two-slit experiment works this way. One intriguing idea is that synchronicity is at work, since the particles act as random elements conforming to an inevitable outcome. But for the most part science has concluded that particles in general (not just light) have both particle AND wave aspects but, in principle, one can only observe one of these aspects at a time. This is suggestive of the most well known tenet of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, which is that as one precisely measures a particle’s momentum, measurements of the particle’s position become less precise, in principle, and vise versa.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of all of this is the surprising relationship that exists between quantum phenomenon and the observer. A feedback loop appears to form between experiment and experimenter. Where once I could talk about events as though I was completely detached from them, now I can no longer make observations about the universe without accounting for my choices in it. But wait… does that mean that I can no longer observe the universe without considering me observing me in it? Of course, now that I’ve said that, I must take into account me observing me observing me observing the universe. The feedback loop never seems to end!
But the feedback loop doesn’t have to end. One might guess that a loop of this kind will eventually crash the system somehow, but that’s not what happens. Instead, at a critical point in the regression, something new emerges. In the case of the two-slit experiment, the individually released particles don’t disappear in panicked confusion. ("Aaah! Two slits! But I’m just a single particle out here! What am I supposed to do?!") Somehow, from within the feedback, the proper pattern emerges, and everything ends just as it’s supposed to.
It’s fortunate for us that the quantum world works the way it does, for if it didn’t the current rules that govern the behaviors of atoms and molecules would be quite different, and life would never emerge on our (or any) planet. Feedback loops and the spontaneous solutions that emerge from them are foundational to our existence. But they are also a recurring theme in the successive levels of the evolution of matter.
delicious
diggeye of the beholder
OK--I'll take a shot at one thing that's kind of weird/significant about this. One theory is that the "wave" is not a material wave but a probability wave--that is the particle has no definite location, only probable locations and the different degrees of probability are what causes the wave pattern. So until the particle is observed it has no existence as a particle; once it is observed the probability wave collapses and it takes on a location as a particle. The implication of that is that it only become material (real?) by our observing it. Reality depends on observers?! Observers who could only come into being because of the bizzarre double nature as waves/particles of what is real?! Now that's a feedback loop!
Hmmm, well the above was a quick answer as I was on my way to class--so I'm not sure it was completely clear. Here's the expanded version. When you fire the particles through a single slit it makes a pattern as if you were firing bullets. When you fire the particles through a double slit you get the wave pattern which suggests interference. However then when you assume the cuteness that you always already had and fire particles one at a time through the double slit--you still get the wave pattern, as if the particle is anticipating the interference it will get from the next particle fired. By the way, I personally think the particles are using radios, not cell phones.
And here's an additional oddity--if you send two particles out to go through the double slit and therefore anticipate a wave pattern, but you set up a detector at one of the slits to measure when that particle passes through the slit (locating the particle)--you won't get the wave pattern.
So the quantum mechanics explanation for this is that particles do not have a definite location until they are observed--up until that point they only have probable locations; they exist as probability waves. If you observe one as it passes through the double slit you collapse the wave to a definite point, so no wave pattern.
As to the fact that the wave shows up even when you send the particles through one at a time--that is to me the absolutely weirdest part--it's as if for the particles our notion of chronological time is not in effect, or that even though the second particle has yet to be fired, it's probable locations are already interfering with the one that has been fired. If that makes any sense at all. 
Thanks Jaz!
Man this stuff is soooooo cool!! I mean really! My mind is going too fast for me to even articulate what I'm thinking. :)
One reason I find this so fascinating is because God created this. He's not only THE Ultimate Artist/Creator..... but THE Ultimate Scientist! Why did God choose for things to work the way they work? It must tell us something about Him? Anyway, that's my main reason for my interest in science. But there is another one...
The show LOST! This has to do with Lost, right? Lately I have thinking a lot about these things and how they relate to LOST. Right now, I don't have much... mostly just a bunch of "dots" that need connecting... BUT I know they connect somehow someway. Maybe you could help. I keep thinking about these words and how they might relate to time, perception, and reality....
Vibrations, Echo, Mirrors, Looking Glass, Waves, Repeat, Reflect, Perception, , Eyes, Observe, Awareness.... I dont know... like I said, they're just a bunch of "dots" that need connecting or tossed out...
Other words: Premonition, Harmonics, Dualism, Dreams, Precognition, Consciousness, Driveshaft- has to do with alignment/balance-which made me think of harmony... Have you heard of "Harmonics"? Check this out:
Hermes Trismegistus, Thrice Great Hermes, the scribe of the Gods, as the ancient Greeks named the mystical Egyptian God Thoth, was said to create by the sound of his voice alone. There were Seven Principles upon which the entire Hermetic Philosophy was based. Describe in ”The Kyballium: a study of Hermetic Philosophy” these are:
1. The principle of Mentalisme: "All is mind"
2. The principle of correspondence: "As Above, so Below".
3. The principle of Vibration:" All is in vibration". (Good Vibrations- Charlie's song/code)
4. The principle of Polarity: " Everything is dual". (Both Polarity and duality is a theme in LOST)
5. The principle of Rhythm: " Everything flows".
6. The principle of Cause and Effect: " Everything happens according to Law". - (makes me think of Desmond- David Hume)
7. The principle of Gender: " Everything has its Masculine and Feminine Principles"
OK I'll stop there...
"particle/wave duality"
Whoa... I didn't even know this was here! Awesome.
BG, there's a common saying in all of this so don't feel discouraged... "if you think you understand quantum physics, you don't understand quantum physics". 'Nuff said.
jaz, your explanation made sense to me, m'dear. 
I'm not too sure about particles "anticipating" interference... I get what you're saying though. I might just be repeating what the clever GC and jaz said... but here goes...
This experiment is really the basis of understanding (or as reality would have it, not understanding) quantum physics. The two-slit experiment was one of the original proofs that light travels in waves, but newer versions show that light also travels as particles because interference lines build up during experimentation just like with light. Light wave patterns are just like waves and ripples of water except that light waves ripple too fast for us to see. And the nature of this "wave-particle" of light is what puts the weird in quantum physics...
...the Heisinberg Uncertainty Priniciple... you can determine either the position or the momentum of an object as accurately as you like, but the act of doing so makes the accuracy of your measurement that much less. Since this contrasted with Einstien's belief that nothing can go faster than light, he spent a good deal of his life trying to determine both the position and the momentum of a particle in this state.
The idea of Einstein and colleagues was to set up an interaction such that two particles go off in opposite directions and do not interact with anything else. Wait until they are far apart, then measure the momentum of one and the position of the other. Because of conservation of momentum, you can determine the momentum of the particle not measured, so when you measure it's position you know both it's momentum and position. But that doesn't mean that Einstien's relativity theory is wrong... it just means that the particles do not communicate by any means we know about. All we know is that every particle knows what every other particle it has ever interacted with is doing.
Particle/wave duality is perhaps the easiest way to get aquainted with quantum theory because it shows how different the atomic world is from our world. There are more evolved theories like Schrodiginer's Cat that work off this idea by explaining that particles communicate simaltaneously until observed. In a way, the success of Schrodinger's equations has prevented people from thinking more deeply about the true nature of the atomic world. Idealy, one way quantum physics could be true is if the particles could communicate faster then the speed of light, which Einstein reasoned would be impossible because of his theory of Relativity. Then there's the Aspect Experiment in which tries to explain that particles can communicate instantaneously through a holographic model. It's really pretty interesting. Synchronicity is believed to work the same way as the GC mentioned above when the nature of real world and the quantum world clash. I think is where the gray areas of Intelligent Design and the Unified Theory is also argued?
Ok, yes, I think we just expained to you in 10 different languages about this quantum weirdness, and I know visual aide can be helpful. I found this video that demonstates the two-slit experiment.
The radio is key!!!! 
Ok I decided to get cute...now what?
I find this interesting, but I want to understand it better.
So let me get this straight. You're saying that I decide to get "cute" (already am) and shoot just one particle at a time at the partition with two slits. OK, done! So, now what? What exactly am I looking at again? I'm a visual person so I am just trying to visualize this.
And what does this mean? What's so significant about waves? I mean what is something fascinating about them? BTW, I'm really curious, I'm not trying to be funny or difficult.