Related papers: 'Two Dogmas' Redux
The measurement problem is seen as an ambiguity of quantum mechanics, or, beyond that, as a contradiction within the theory: Quantum mechanics offers two conflicting descriptions of the Wigner's-friend experiment. As we argue in this note…
The Wigner's friend paradox concerns one of the most puzzling problems of quantum mechanics: the consistent description of multiple nested observers. Recently, a variation of Wigner's gedankenexperiment, introduced by Frauchiger and Renner,…
Until recently Jeffrey Bub and Itamar Pitowsky, in the framework of an information theoretic view of quantum mechanics, claimed first that to the measurement problem in its ordinary formulation there correspond in effect two measurement…
We reformulate the problem of the "interpretation of quantum mechanics" as the problem of DERIVING the quantum mechanical formalism from a set of simple physical postulates. We suggest that the common unease with taking quantum mechanics as…
The Wigner's friend type of thought experiments manifest the conceptual challenge on how different observers can have consistent descriptions of a quantum measurement event. In this paper, we analyze the extended version of Wigner's friend…
I suggest that the common unease with taking quantum mechanics as a fundamental description of nature (the "measurement problem") could derive from the use of an incorrect notion, as the unease with the Lorentz transformations before…
Everett's interpretation of quantum mechanics was proposed to avoid problems inherent in the prevailing interpretational frame. It assumes that quantum mechanics can be applied to any system and that the state vector always evolves…
The Wigner's friend thought experiment was intended to illustrate the difficulty one has in describing an agent as a quantum system when that agent performs a measurement. While it does pose a challenge to the orthodox interpretation of…
Recent extended formulations of the Wigner's friend thought experiment throw the measurement problem of quantum mechanics into sharper relief. Here I respond to an invitation by Renner to provide a consistent and concrete set of rules for…
We argue that the intractable part of the measurement problem -- the 'big' measurement problem -- is a pseudo-problem that depends for its legitimacy on the acceptance of two dogmas. The first dogma is John Bell's assertion that measurement…
We discuss the role that intuitive theories of physics play in the interpretation of quantum mechanics. We compare and contrast na\"ive physics with quantum mechanics and argue that quantum mechanics is not just hard to understand but that…
I argue that the Oxford school Everett interpretation is internally incoherent, because we cannot claim that in an Everettian universe the kinds of reasoning we have used to arrive at our beliefs about quantum mechanics would lead us to…
A goal of most interpretations of quantum mechanics is to avoid the apparent intrusion of the observer into the measurement process. Such intrusion is usually seen to arise because observation somehow selects a single actuality from among…
We take a fresh look at Wigner's Friend thought-experiment and some of its more recent variants and extensions, such as the Frauchiger-Renner (FR) Paradox. We discuss various solutions proposed in the literature, focusing on a few…
According to QBism, quantum states, unitary evolutions, and measurement operators are all understood as personal judgments of the agent using the formalism. Meanwhile, quantum measurement outcomes are understood as the personal experiences…
Exploiting the tension between the two dynamics of quantum theory (QT) in the Wigner's Friend thought experiment, we point out that the standard QT leads to inconsistency in observed probabilities of measurement outcomes between two…
Quantum theory in its conventional formulation is notoriously subject to various measurement-related paradoxes, as exemplified by the "Schrodinger's Cat" and "Wigner's Friend" thought experiments. It has been shown, for example by…
The quantum measurement problem can be regarded as the tension between the two alternative dynamics prescribed by quantum mechanics: the unitary evolution of the wave function and the state-update rule (or "collapse") at the instant a…
The extended Wigner's friend problem deals with two Observers each measuring a sealed laboratory in which a friend is making a quantum measurement. We investigate this problem by relying on the basic rules of quantum mechanics as exposed by…
Many advocates of the Everettian interpretation consider that theirs is the only approach to take quantum mechanics really seriously, and that this approach allows to deduce a fantastic scenario for our reality, one that consists of an…