English

Fundamental Limit on Angular Measurements and Rotations from Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity

Quantum Physics 2021-11-10 v2 High Energy Physics - Theory

Abstract

We show that the precision of an angular measurement or rotation (e.g., on the orientation of a qubit or spin state) is limited by fundamental constraints arising from quantum mechanics and general relativity (gravitational collapse). The limiting precision is r1r^{-1} in Planck units, where rr is the physical extent of the (possibly macroscopic) device used to manipulate the spin state. This fundamental limitation means that spin states S1S_1 and S2S_2 cannot be experimentally distinguished from each other if they differ by a sufficiently small rotation. Experiments cannot exclude the possibility that the space of quantum state vectors (i.e., Hilbert space) is fundamentally discrete, rather than continuous. We discuss the implications for finitism: does physics require infinity or a continuum?

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2108.11990,
  title  = {Fundamental Limit on Angular Measurements and Rotations from Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity},
  author = {Xavier Calmet and Stephen D. H. Hsu},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2108.11990},
  year   = {2021}
}

Comments

10 pages. Version to appear in Physics Letters B