Comment by XorNot

> Because not everyone has the prerequisite math or time/attention to go into quantum field theory for a rather intuitive point about mass and fields.

This gets into the problem though: the article is framed as "the Heisenberg explanation is wrong". Okay...then if thats your goal, to explain that without math, you need to do better then "actually it's this other parameter, trust me bro".

As read, I cannot tell if there's something new or different here, or if "stiffness" just wraps up the Heisenberg uncertainty principle neatly so you can approach the problem classically.

The core question coming into the article which I was looking for an answer for is "is the Heisenberg uncertainty principle explanation wrong?" and...it doesn't answer that. Showing that you can model the system a different way without reference to it, but by just introducing a parameter which neatly gives the right result, doesn't grant any additional explanatory power. It's just another opaque parameter: so, is "stiffness" wrapping up a quantum truth in a way which interacts with the real world? Is the uncertainty principle explanation unable to actually model these fields at all? I have no idea!

But the Uncertainty principle is something you can demonstrate in a first year lab with a laser and a diffraction grating, and turns up all the time in all sorts of basic physics (i.e. tunneling). Where does "stiffness" turn up and how does it relate? Again, I have no idea! The article purports to explain, but rather just declares.