About this project
I'm a California artist who specializes in science-themed art (SciArt). I'm currently making a piece of conceptual art called FATE that takes the form of an arcade game. It consists of a sample of radioactive ore under a glass dome with an adjacent Geiger counter, some LED digital displays and a vintage CRT screen packaged in an austere cabinet reminiscent of a pin ball machine.
After a couple of quarters are inserted into the game, instructions are displayed on the CRT telling the player to grasp two handles while a nine second countdown ensues. During the countdown, the Geiger counter registers the particles emitted by the radioactive source and their total is displayed. When the countdown is done, the player is rewarded with a golden coin if the count is an even number or punished with an electric shock if the count is odd.
The point of the game is to make the player assume the role of Schrodinger’s Cat as a performance artist in an actual experiment in quantum physics. The cat idea was first proposed by Irwin Schrodinger as a thought experiment in 1935 to illustrate the apparent paradoxes in the "Copenhagen Interpretation" of quantum physics. In this interpretation, the possible outcomes of a measurement exist simultaneously as a combination of different quantum states. Schrodinger proposed putting a cat in a box containing a device that would release poison gas if a nuclear decay occurred in a radioactive sample next to the cat. According to the Copenhagen Interptetation, the cat should be in a superposition of dead and live states until a measurement of the cat's condition is made by opening the box. The aim of the piece is to create a superposition of psychological states in the player's mind that will not be resolved into one state or the other until a quantum mechanical outcome is known. The prize for winning the game is, appropriately, a golden coin with a live cat on one side and a deceased cat on the other. I'll use the Kickstarter funding to mint the coins.
Risks and challenges
I see no risks in completing this project. I have the requisite physics background, electronics knowledge and fabrication skills needed to finish this project. I've already started collecting the parts and have begun assembly. The only issue is the somewhat expensive, up-front cost of having custom coins minted. This needs to be financed in exchange for a portion of this minting.
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Funding period
- (30 days)