Doctor Henry Morton patiently explained the situation to Irene, his wife. “We see things like this in the lab all the time. Quantum tunneling, even though it is observed to occur strictly on a subatomic scale, is a phenomenon that can occur on a macroscopic scale, theoretically on an object of any size. Even the entire universe itself, given enough time, perhaps in ten googolplex years, will eventually tunnel into a completely different state of existence. But at the universe’s present age, it is extremely unlikely--almost incalculably unlikely--that any object large enough to hold in your hand has ever tunneled from one place in the universe to another. But the important thing to remember is that we’re talking about probabilities here. Though the probability is so low that it may well be considered impossible, the probability is not quite zero. That we have witnessed such a macroscopic quantum tunneling event, not once, but twice in our lifetimes, is cause for celebration! Not in a trillion years will any of humanity’s descendants be likely to witness even one, much less two, such remarkable quantum tunneling events!”

Irene was not impressed. “Twice in our lifetimes? Try three times in one week.”

“Has it been three times?”

“Oh, you’re such a dunderhead! Why can’t you just admit that you locked the keys in the car?”

Copyright (c) by BSW, 2007.  All Rights Reserved.