The Coming of the Quantum Cats can - given different social conditions - develop completely different character traits (timid or assertive, benevolent or predatory, etc.) The title refers to the famous thought-experiment known as "Schrödinger's Cat", where the outcome of a real-world event depends on a quantum event. By some interpretations, the real-world object, in this case a cat, must be in two states simultaneously until it is observed. However, the story is more closely related to the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics where all possible outcomes of an event occur, each in its own parallel universe. The same concept was treated, somewhat more pessimistically, in
Introduction to quantum mechanics in other aspects like waves. Matter—the "stuff" of the universe consisting of particles such as electrons and atoms—exhibits wavelike behavior too. Some light sources, such as neon lights, give off only certain frequencies of light. Quantum mechanics shows that light, along with all other forms of electromagnetic radiation, comes in discrete units, called photons, and predicts its energies, colors, and spectral intensities. A single photon is a "quantum", or smallest observable amount, of the electromagnetic field because a partial photon has never been observed. More broadly, quantum mechanics shows that many quantities, such as angular momentum, that appeared continuous in