Mathematics is a language of expression that has the ability to imperfectly describe and predict the behavior of natural phenomena. Numbers are the alphabet, and variables form the grammatical structure. Those who can speak mathematics arrange sentences, equations, for a variety of purposes. Like you or I, they can be engaged in small talk or serious conversation. Like any language, there are dialects so you have astrology, feng shui, mathematics, numerology, science, religion, and engineering to name a few. Some of us have heard of quantum theory, but few outside the practitioners of physics know what it is. The dictionary isn't much help either. This is not a scientist's description of quantum theory per se, but an explanation of how quantum theory is relevant to our lives. Subsequent to the confirmation of the existence of the atom, it became clear to scientists of the day that the old physics models that described the behavior of natural phenomena such as the earth and planets did not describe or predict the behavior of atoms. Atoms were of great interest because of the large amounts of energy that could be unleashed and harnessed if their behavior were properly understood. In the 1920's '30's, several scientists contributed to producing the model to used to describe and predict the atomic model. The only one whose name the general public remembers is Albert Einstein. This is because his first contributions concerning the mathematical descriptions of the transformation of energy into mass, the special theory of relativity, was a major stepping stone to understanding energy and mass at a small scale. The concept behind the model was to find ways to measure, or quantify, the components of an atom. Hence, the name quantum theory. Because atoms were the smallest particles known and made up the known universe, it follows that a successful theory had to describe the behavior of the larger universe as well or better than prior models. I've been using the phrase "describe and predict" quite often, and here is where the relevance of the phrase comes in. Quantum theory predicted such phenomena as black holes that were observed long after the theory was accepted by the majority of the physics community. It was accepted by the physics community because it successfully described atomic behavior, and because it successfully calculated well known observations such Mercury's closest distance to the sun. Returning to my statements about our perceptions of art and science, the Big Bang is not a theory nor is it a natural phenomena predicted by quantum theory. The Big Bang, as well as the notion that no object can exceed the speed of light, are conceptual constructs by Einstein to address the limitations of his special theory of relativity. These are the instances where E=mc2 ceases to be an expression of the natural world and becomes just an equation. There is no natural phenomena described or predicted that corresponds to when E=mc2 has a value of zero. Despite what you were taught in school, we have the Big Bang so that the variables E and m can never be equal to zero. Nothing can exceed the speed of light, because then it would no longer be a constant in the equation. Then you would three unknown variables in the equation, which is extremely difficult to solve. The problem is that most of us, even many scientists, accept these logical constructs as incontrovertible truths because this is what we were taught. What we were taught is subject to the prevailing winds of the time. They are fluid concepts that somehow become solidified and rigid within many of us over time. This is elevation of science above other fields. As a conceptual device, the Big Bang is no different from the behavioral characteristics of people determined by zodiac symbols. Perhaps, in some ways, it is even less effective than astrology: answers to the question of what the Big Bang often lead to the preposterous or "I don't know". I feel that I must emphasize that these conceits do not diminish the usefulness of Einstein's equation, but they should demythologize science. From these examples, one should understand that science is a subjective art, and that it was Einstein's talent that he understood a great deal about the universe that he could not necessarily articulate in the medium of his choice. I chose the name quantum photography because I made the arbitrary decision to draw parallels between mathematics, science, and art. Arbitrary does not imply meaningless, and there is an enormous historical precedent of artists looking to science for inspiration. By this, I don't mean something sophomoric like graphing mathematical equations and hanging them on the gallery walls as art. Mathematics, science, and art are all ways of describing the natural world, and from experience I knew that I could probably find existing scientific or mathematical models for adaptation to an existing form of art. Quantum photography takes the same photographic material that has always existed and uses it in a different way. For me, the inability of existing photographic terms to describe the visual effect of this different way was paralleled by the inability of older physics models to accurately describe the observed behavior of atoms. Because the visual effects were the result of looking at photography from what I considered to be its smallest elemental components, I found quantum theory to be an appropriate parallel. essay continued

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