Quantum Mechanics and Experience

"You get curious about something and you mess around. That's what science is in the beginning, you mess around."

The other day I dug out my copy of Quantum Mechanics and Experience. Just for fun. ;)

(Between you and me, I've never made it all the way through that book. I get to the point where I have too many questions, and then I have to stop and go find answers. Ex: matrix mechanics - can they do X, Y, and Z things that I want them to do?)

On my first attempt to read it (years ago), the analogies were pretty useful - color (black, white) and hardness (hard, soft). Today, the analogies were a little distracting, as I am currently struggling to connect all of these things, and I suspect that there is something that is being overlooked in the nature of the actual properties that can be measured under this paradigm.

Not too far into the book (pages 3-4) though, I realize that the description of the sequence of measurements (color, hard, color) and its outcome sounds vaguely familiar... (pizza, something else, pizza). There's a link here - I just know it! (Where 'I just know it' means 'I'm going to keep pursuing this line of thought until I satisfy myself as to the non/existence of said link.')

My other big question of the day stems from this - "[W]e are unable to move the statistics of color disruption even so much as one millionth of one percentage point away from fifty-fifty, in either direction, no matter what we try." Why?

Seriously, I want to know why. Do we know why? What do we speculate is the reason why? (Where 'we' means 'you guys'. ;)

To me this suggests 'forces' at work that create/need/default to an equilibrium state. What kind of 'forces'? And the bigger question... an equilibrium of what? Why should so many ostensibly different properties end up in an equilibrium of their respective potential states, unless there is something that they all have in common?

Hmm... getting through this book may take awhile.