Quantum physics is spectacular, head-scratching, fascinating, confusing, and a specific understanding of it is beyond my brain’s pay grade.  Proper explanation, like much of science, demands models and analogies, but when these are properly used the general description it provides of the world and philosophy of science that it yields is comprehensible and revealing.

As case in point, see the Wired Science write-up (link below) of a recent paper in Science that helps to explain why there is a “limit” to the “weirdness” of quantum physics.  I think you’ll agree that the analogy is essential for the reader to even attempt to understand the scientific findings.

Science is not just about facts, especially when we get really small or really large.  We need theory, model, and analogy to help us construct a complete vision of what the data provides.  Therefore, scientists necessarily must interpret the data to the best of their abilities.  This oft-neglected but essential aspect of science is likely news to non-scientists (and often taken for granted by scientists).

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/11/entangled-uncertainty/