Physicists Show That Quantum Ignorance Is Hard to Expose

[Archean]

No one likes a know-it-all but we expect to be able to catch them out: someone who acts like they know everything but doesn't can always be tripped up with a well-chosen question. Can't they? Not so. New research in quantum physics has shown that a quantum know-it-all could lack information about a subject as a whole, yet answer almost perfectly any question about the subject's parts.

A very weird concept, but nonetheless something new to ponder about in quantum physics.

 

[Gulli]

Not entirely sure what they're saying but it seems to me they mean that it is impossible to statistically determine if an agent only knows x% or more of the total information if you only ask him to provide x% of the information. This is also true clasically, provided you ask him only questions about the part of the information you gave him information about, but in quantum mechanics it is apparently true even if you ask him about a part of the information that you didn't let him peer into. My guess is this is because quantum mechanics is all about statistics and apparently the expectation value of how many questions you'll get right is high enough to fool your inquisitor into thinking you've read all the information.