English

Peaceful Coexistence: Examining Kent's Relativistic Solution to the Quantum Measurement Problem

Quantum Physics 2017-10-24 v1 History and Philosophy of Physics

Abstract

Can there be `peaceful coexistence' between quantum theory and special relativity? Thirty years ago, Shimony hoped that isolating the culprit (i.e. the false assumption) in proofs of Bell inequalities as Outcome Independence would secure such peaceful coexistence: or, if not secure it, at least show a way---maybe the best or only way---to secure it. In this paper, I begin by being sceptical of Shimony's approach, urging that we need a relativistic solution to the quantum measurement problem (Section 2). Then I analyse Outcome Independence in Kent's realist one-world Lorentz-invariant interpretation of quantum theory (Sections 3 and 4). Then I consider Shimony's other condition, Parameter Independence, both in Kent's proposal and more generally, in the light of recent remarkable theorems by Colbeck, Renner and Leegwater (Section 5). For both Outcome Independence and Parameter Independence, there is a striking analogy with the situation in pilot-wave theory. Finally, I will suggest that these recent theorems make some kind of peaceful coexistence mandatory for someone who, like Shimony, endorses Parameter Independence.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1710.07844,
  title  = {Peaceful Coexistence: Examining Kent's Relativistic Solution to the Quantum Measurement Problem},
  author = {Jeremy Butterfield},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1710.07844},
  year   = {2017}
}

Comments

43 pages, one figure. Forthcoming in the Proceedings of the 2015 Nagoya Winter Workshop on Reality and Measurement in Quantum Theory. Dedicated to the memory of Abner Shimony (1928 - 2015)