English

The Measurement Problem Is the "Measurement" Problem

Quantum Physics 2019-04-03 v2 History and Philosophy of Physics

Abstract

The term "measurement" in quantum theory (as well as in other physical theories) is ambiguous: It is used to describe both an experience - e.g., an observation in an experiment - and an interaction with the system under scrutiny. If doing physics is regarded as a creative activity to develop a meaningful description of the world, then one has to carefully discriminate between the two notions: An observer's account of experience - consitutive to meaning - is hardly expressed exhaustively by the formal framework of an interaction within one particular theory. We develop a corresponding perspective onto central terms in quantum mechanics in general, and onto the measurement problem in particular.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1810.04573,
  title  = {The Measurement Problem Is the "Measurement" Problem},
  author = {Arne Hansen and Stefan Wolf},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1810.04573},
  year   = {2019}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-23T04:34:59.645Z