Is Schr\"odinger's Cat Alive?

TL;DR

The paper discusses the historical and ongoing significance of Schrödinger's cat paradox, emphasizing its role in illustrating quantum reality's persistence across scales and the effects of decoherence in the macroscopic world.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of Schrödinger's cat paradox, highlighting its renewed relevance and interpreting it as evidence of quantum effects at all scales.

Findings

Quantum reality exists at all scales.

Decoherence masks quantum effects in macroscopic environments.

Schrödinger's cat remains a symbol of quantum paradoxes.

Abstract

Erwin Schr\"odinger is famous for presenting his wave equation of motion that jump-started quantum mechanics. His disenchantment with the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics led him to unveil the Schr\"odinger's cat paradox, which did not get much attention for nearly half a century. In the meantime, disappointment with quantum mechanics turned his interest to biology facilitating, albeit in a peripheral way, the revelation of the structure of DNA. Interest in Schr\"odinger's cat has recently come roaring back making its appearance conspicuously in numerous scientific articles. From the arguments presented here, it would appear that the legendary Schr\"odinger's cat is here to stay, symbolizing a profound truth that quantum reality exists at all scales; but we do not observe it in our daily macroscopic world as it is masked for all practical purposes, most likely by environmental decoherence with irreversible thermal effects.