Related papers: Stern-Gerlach: conceptually clean or acceptably va…
Neutrino oscillations appear to be a simple quantum mechanical phenomenon. However, a closer look at them reveals a number of subtle points and apparent paradoxes. Some of the basic issues of the theory of neutrino oscillations are still…
Quantum mechanics, one of the most successful theories in the history of science, was created to account for physical systems not describable by classical physics. Though it is consistent with all experiments conducted thus far, many of its…
Quantum mechanics and the theory of gravity are presently not compatible. A particular question is whether gravity causes decoherence - an unavoidable source of noise. Several models for gravitational decoherence have been proposed, not all…
It is shown how all the major conceptual difficulties of standard (textbook) quantum mechanics, including the two measurement problems and the (supposed) nonlocality that conflicts with special relativity, are resolved in the consistent or…
A discursive, non-technical, analysis is made of some of the basic issues that arise in almost any approach to quantum gravity, and of how these issues stand in relation to recent developments in the field. Specific topics include the…
The paper attempts to convince that the orthodox interpretation of quantum mechanics does not contradict philosophical realism by throwing light onto certain properties of quantum systems that seem to have escaped attention as yet. The…
Is the universe digital or analog? In this essay I argue that both classical and quantum physics include limits that prevent us from definitively answering that question. That quantum physics does so is no surprise. That classical physics…
It is often stated that complex numbers are essential in quantum theory. In this article, the need for complex numbers in quantum theory is motivated using the results of tandem Stern-Gerlach experiments
In the well known Copenhagen interpretation of Quantum mechanics, advocated by N. Bohr, the physical objects and the experimental results can be described only in a macroscopic language, leaving any possible microscopic description as…
The quantum mechanical measurement process is considered. A hypothetical concept of irrational dynamical variables is proposed. A possible definition of measurement is discussed along with a mathematical method to calculate experimental…
The Frauchiger-Renner argument purports to show that the standard framework of quantum mechanics yields a contradiction when used to reason about systems containing agents who are themselves using quantum mechanics to perform deductions.…
Quantum mechanics describes successfully numerous quantum phenomena both microscopic and macroscopic, such as superconductivity. But the controversies about quantum mechanics, in the old days and present day, reveal fundamental obscurity in…
Do the partial order and ortholattice operations of a quantum logic correspond to the logical implication and connectives of classical logic? Re-phrased, how far might a classical understanding of quantum mechanics be, in principle,…
We discuss that there is a crucial contradiction within quantum mechanics. We derive a proposition concerning a quantum expectation value under the assumption of the existence of the directions in a spin-1/2 system. The quantum predictions…
Whether or not space-time is fundamentally discrete is of central importance for the development of the theory of quantum gravity. If the fundamental description of space-time is discrete, typically represented in terms of a graph or…
Richard Feynman famously declared, "I think that I can safely say that nobody really understands quantum mechanics." Sean Carroll lamented the persistence of this sentiment in a recent opinion piece entitled, "Even Physicists Don't…
This is a preliminary version of an article to appear in the forthcoming Ashgate Companion to the New Philosophy of Physics. I don't advocate any particular approach to the measurement problem (not here, at any rate!) but I do focus on the…
Quantum cosmology has traditionally been studied at the level of symmetry-reduced minisuperspace models, analyzing the behavior of wave functions. However, in the absence of a complete full setting of quantum gravity and detailed knowledge…
In this work we analyze the deep link between the 20th Century positivist re-foundation of physics and the famous measurement problem of quantum mechanics. We attempt to show why this is not an "obvious" nor "self evident" problem for the…
There are many striking phenomena which are attributed to ``quantum coherence''. It is natural to wonder if there are new quantum coherence effects waiting to be discovered which could lead to interesting results and perhaps even practical…