What law says it is impossible to determine the exact location and velocity of an electron at any given moment?

Answer 1

This is because of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. It is a part of quantum mechanics. It has to do with an electron having properties of both a particle and and wave.

If you only imagine an electron to be a particle, this can be somewhat explained by the process of measuring the position or velocity of the electron. If the data is measured with light, then when a photon hits the electron, it changes the electrons speed and position. We may be able to find one, but in the process, the other will be changed.

Answer 2

heisenberg's uncertaintyprinciple

"In quantum mechanics, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle states by precise inequalities that certain pairs of physical properties, such as position and momentum, cannot be simultaneously known to arbitrarily high precision. That is, the more precisely one property is measured, the less precisely the other can be measured."

Answer 3

The universe does not have an infinitely fine structure, it is grainy, on a sufficiently small scale. Electrons are very small particles, among the smallest. The only way we can look at an individual electron is to bounce a photon off it and then measure what happened to that photon (strictly speaking it does not have to be a photon, it could be another particle, but photons give the best result). When we bounce a photon off an electron, we are going to change the electron in some way. Depending upon how we perform this examination, we can measure the position but change the momentum of the electron, or we can measure the momentum but change the position of the electron. And we cannot tell what the change is, either, it is a random change that we have not measured. We will only know what we measure. If there existed some kind of particle that was much smaller than an electron, we could use that extremely small particle to measure an electron without causing much change in the electron, but no such particles are available. So these are limitations that are imposed upon us by the structure of the universe in which we live. There is a certain inescapable amount of uncertainty in our measurements. We can be very precise but we cannot ever be 100% precise in our measurements. That is a kind of translation of Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, from its original formulation which is in the form of a mathematical equation. And this has surprisingly profound implications for physics.

Answer 4

The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle states that it is impossible to determine both the exact position and velocity of a particle, such as an electron, simultaneously. This principle is a fundamental aspect of quantum mechanics and highlights the inherent uncertainty in the behavior of subatomic particles.

Answer 5

Because the electrons move in a zig zag pattern through the medium through which they travel they do not just move in a straight line

Answer 6

The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle

Answer 7

This is the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.

Answer 8

Because you touch yourself at night.