Related papers: How to introduce physical quantities physically
We attempt to contribute some novel points of view to the "foundations of quantum mechanics", using mathematical tools from "quantum probability theory" (such as the theory of operator algebras). We first introduce an abstract algebraic…
To understand the foundations of quantum mechanics, we have to think carefully about how theoretical concepts are rooted in -- and limited by -- the nature of experience, as Bohr attempted to show. Geometrical pictures of physical phenomena…
Absolute space is eliminated from the body of mechanics by gauging translations and rotations in the Lagrangian of a classical system. The procedure implies the addition of compensating terms to the kinetic energy, in such a way that the…
It is argued that quantum mechanics follows naturally from the assumptions that there are no fundamental causal laws but only probabilities for physical processes that are constrained by symmetries, and reality is relational in the sense…
The physical meaning of the operators is not reducible to the intrinsic relations of the quantum system, since unitary transformations can find other operators satisfying the exact same relations. The physical meaning is determined…
We develop a theory for describing composite objects in physics. These can be static objects, such as tables, or things that happen in spacetime (such as a region of spacetime with fields on it regarded as being composed of smaller such…
The nanophysics is halfway between the size scales of quantum mechanics and macroscopic physics governed by the laws of Newton and Einstein. The correct definition of nanophysics is the physics of structures and artefacts with dimensions in…
Analysing Quantum Measurement requires analysing the physics of amplification since amplification of phenomena from one scale to another scale is essential to measurement. There still remains the task of working this into an axiomatic…
Learning to use math in physics involves combining (blending) our everyday experiences and the conceptual ideas of physics with symbolic mathematical representations. Graphs are one of the best ways to learn to build the blend. They are a…
A two boundary quantum mechanics without time ordered causal structure is advocated as consistent theory. The apparent causal structure of usual "near future" macroscopic phenomena is attributed to a cosmological asymmetry and to rules…
We generalize the concept of a field by allowing addition to be a partial operation. We show that elements of such a "partially additive field" share many similarities with physical quantities. In particular, they form subsets of mutually…
A physical theory of the world is presented under the unifying principle that all of nature is laid out before us and experienced through the passage of time. The one-dimensional progression in time is opened out into a multi-dimensional…
The basic premise of Quantum Mechanics, embodied in the doctrine of wave-particle duality, assigns both, a particle and a wave structure to the physical entities. The classical laws describing the motion of a particle and the evolution of a…
Physical laws are a set of rules in the relationship between observations made by the experimenter. All these observations are made through a mechanism that links the external world to the experimenter's awareness, a mechanism which is not…
This paper investigates the mathematical representation of time in physics. In existing theories time is represented by the real numbers, hence their formal properties represent properties of time: these are surveyed. The central question…
Quantum theory expresses the observable relations between physical properties in terms of probabilities that depend on the specific context described by the "state" of a system. However, the laws of physics that emerge at the macroscopic…
We suggest a somewhat non-standard view on a set of curious, paradoxical from the standpoint of simple classical physics and everyday experience phenomena. There are the quantisation (discrete set of values) of the observables (e.g.,…
Quantum mechanics is among the most important and successful mathematical model for describing our physical reality. The traditional formulation of quantum mechanics is linear and algebraic. In contrast classical mechanics is a geometrical…
Statistical mechanics is one of the most powerful and elegant tools in the quantitative sciences. One key virtue of statistical mechanics is that it is designed to examine large systems with many interacting degrees of freedom, providing a…
After a summary of Bohr's views and their relation to Kant's theory of science, two fruitless lines of attack on the measurement problem are discussed: the way of the psi-ontologist and the way of the QBist. In the remainder of the paper…