Related papers: Subjectivists about Quantum Probabilities Should b…
At present, quantum theory leaves unsettled which quantities ontologically, physically exist in a quantum system. Do observables such as energy and position have meaningful values only at the precise moment of measurement, as in the…
Dualities in physics have challenged traditional forms of scientific realism by undermining the idea that theories describe a unique underlying ontology. In this paper, we develop a new perspective on scientific realism that responds to…
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…
In this paper, we present a general theory of finite quantum measurements, for which we assume that the state space of the measured system is a finite dimensional Hilbert space and that the possible outcomes of a measurement is a finite set…
One of the most central and controversial element of quantum mechanics is the use of non zero vectors of a Hilbert space (or, more generally, of one dimension subspaces) for representing the state of a quantum system. In particular, the…
It is proposed a possible new approach of quantum measurements (QMS), disconnected of the traditional interpretation of uncertainty relations and independent of any appeal to the strange idea of collapse (reduction) of wave functions. The…
The concept of realism in quantum mechanics means that results of measurement are caused by physical variables, hidden or observable. Local hidden variables were proved unable to explain results of measurements on entangled particles tested…
This pseudo-paper consists of excerpts drawn from two of my quantum-email samizdats. Section 1 draws a picture of a physical world whose essence is ``Darwinism all the way down.'' Section 2 outlines how quantum theory should be viewed in…
A characteristical property of a classical physical theory is that the observables are real functions taking an exact outcome on every (pure) state; in a quantum theory, at the contrary, a given observable on a given state can take several…
It is argued that Feynman's rules for evaluating probabilities, combined with von Neumann's principle of psycho-physical parallelism, help avoid inconsistencies, often associated with quantum theory. The former allows one to assign…
The state $\rho$ of a quantum system can be represented by a vector $\mathbf{P}_{\mathcal{M}}(\rho)$ of outcome probabilities for a set of measurements $\mathcal{M}$. Such representations appear throughout physics, for example, in quantum…
Quantum physics can only make statistical predictions about possible measurement outcomes, and these predictions originate from an operator algebra that is fundamentally different from the conventional definition of probability as a…
In this article, we propose to use the formalism of quantum mechanics to describe and explain the so-called "abnormal" behaviour of agents in certain decision or choice contexts. The basic idea is to postulate that the preferences of these…
The concept of probability was prominent in the original foundations of quantum mechanics, and continues to be so today. Indeed, the controversies regarding objective and subjective interpretations of probability have again become active. I…
Generically the probabilities of observational results depend upon both the quantum state and the rules for extracting the probabilities from it. It is often argued that inflation may make our observations independent of the quantum state.…
The interpretation of the meaning of Quantum Mechanics has faced controversy since its inception. Bell's inequalities are a touchstone in this controversy. Their observed violation demonstrates that at least one of the hypotheses involved…
Despite various parallels between quantum states and ordinary information, quantum no-go-theorems have convinced many that there is no realistic framework that might underly quantum theory, no reality that quantum states can represent…
A new formulation of quantum mechanics is developed which does not require the concept of the wave-particle duality. Rather than assigning probabilities to outcomes, probabilities are instead assigned to entire fine-grained histories. The…
Quantum theory makes the most accurate empirical predictions and yet it lacks simple, comprehensible physical principles from which the theory can be uniquely derived. A broad class of probabilistic theories exist which all share some…
A source of much difficulty and confusion in the interpretation of quantum mechanics is a ``naive realism about operators.'' By this we refer to various ways of taking too seriously the notion of operator-as-observable, and in particular to…