Related papers: Realism and instrumentalism about the wave functio…
A century after the discovery of quantum mechanics, the meaning of quantum mechanics still remains elusive. This is largely due to the puzzling nature of the wave function, the central object in quantum mechanics. If we are realists about…
Realism -- the idea that the concepts in physical theories refer to 'things' existing in the real world -- is introduced as a tool to analyze the status of the wave-function. Although the physical entities are recognized by the existence of…
In this paper I review three different positions on the wave function, namely: nomological realism, dispositionalism, and configuration space realism by regarding as essential their capacity to account for the world of our experience. I…
This chapter reexamines wave function realism (WFR) through the lens of phenomenology. We begin by situating WFR within the broader debate about the ontology of the quantum state and the temptation to "read off" metaphysics from…
Although quantum mechanics is one of our most successful physical theories, there has been a long-standing debate about the interpretation of the wave function---the central object of the theory. Two prominent views are that (i) it…
The most puzzling issue in the foundations of quantum mechanics is perhaps that of the status of the wave function of a system in a quantum universe. Is the wave function objective or subjective? Does it represent the physical state of the…
What ontology does realism about the quantum state suggest? The main extant view in contemporary philosophy of physics is wave-function realism. We elaborate the sense in which wave-function realism does provide an ontological picture; and…
Quantum mechanics is an outstandingly successful description of nature, underpinning fields from biology through chemistry to physics. At its heart is the quantum wavefunction, the central tool for describing quantum systems. Yet it is…
The present study attempts to provide a consistent and coherent account of what the world could be like, given the conceptual framework and results of contemporary quantum theory. It is suggested that standard quantum mechanics can, and…
I argue that we have good reason for being realist about quantum states. Though a research programme of attempting to construct a plausible theory that accounts for quantum phenomena without ontic quantum states is well-motivated, that…
In a recent paper (arXiv:1111.3328), Pusey, Barrett and Rudolph claim to prove that statistical interpretations of quantum mechanics do not work. In fact, their proof assumes that all statistical interpretations must be based on hidden…
A discussion of the quantum mechanical use of superposition or entangled states shows that descriptions containing only statements about state vectors and experiments outputs are the most suitable for Quantum Mechanics. In particular, it is…
The nonrelativistic wavefunction of a quantum state that contains all its information is derived directly from the effective quantum fields of the standard model of particle physics, which are the fundamental elements of reality of the…
In this paper we apply the formalism of the analytical signal theory to the Schrodinger wavefunction. Making use exclusively of the wave-particle duality and the principle of relativistic covariance, we actually derive the form of the…
Scientific realism is the philosophical stance that science tracks truth, in particular in its depiction of the world's ontology. Ontologically, this involves a commitment to the existence of entities posited by our best scientific…
We provide a rigorous definition of local realism. We show that the universal wave function cannot be a complete description of a local reality. Finally, we construct a local-realistic model for quantum theory.
First, this article considers the nature of quantum reality (the reality responsible for quantum phenomena) and the concept of realism (our ability to represent this reality) in quantum theory, in conjunction with the roles of locality,…
We suggest a contextual realist interpretation of relational quantum mechanics. The principal point is a correct understanding of the concept of reality and taking into account the categorical distinction between the ideal and the real.…
According to scientific realism, science gives us an approximately true description of what the world is like. But what does it mean? In this chapter, we focus on the ontological and metaphysical aspects of this discussion. That is, we are…
Recently, it has been argued [arXiv:1111.6597, arXiv:1005.5173] that different quantum states do necessarily correspond to different elements of reality, under the assumption that quantum mechanics is correct and that measurement settings…