Related papers: Understanding Quantum Theory
Difficulties and discomfort with the interpretation of quantum mechanics are due to differences in language between it and classical physics. Analogies to The Special Theory of Relativity, which also required changes in the basic worldview…
Historically, appearance of the quantum theory led to a prevailing view that Nature is indeterministic. The arguments for the indeterminism and proposals for indeterministic and deterministic approaches are reviewed. These include collapse…
The usual formulation of quantum theory is rather abstract. In recent work I have shown that we can, nevertheless, obtain quantum theory from five reasonable axioms. Four of these axioms are obviously consistent with both classical…
While its applications have made quantum theory arguably the most successful theory in physics, its interpretation continues to be the subject of lively debate within the community of physicists and philosophers concerned with conceptual…
Interpretations of key concepts, such as uncertainty relations, kinetic energy, value of an observable, probability distributions, the projection or collapse of a wave function postulate, and discrete versus continuous values, that appear…
The probabilistic predictions of quantum theory are conventionally obtained from a special probabilistic axiom. But that is unnecessary because all the practical consequences of such predictions follow from the remaining, non-probabilistic,…
Quantum mechanics is a fundamentally probabilistic theory (at least so far as the empirical predictions are concerned). It follows that, if one wants to properly understand quantum mechanics, it is essential to clearly understand the…
Quantum theory is a tremendously successful physical theory, but nevertheless suffers from two serious problems: the measurement problem and the problem of interpretational underdetermination. The latter, however, is largely overlooked as a…
Interpretation is not the only way to explain a theory's success, form and features, and nor is it the only way to solve problems we see with a theory. This can also be done by giving a reductive explanation of the theory, by reference to a…
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…
An approach is presented treating decision theory as a probabilistic theory based on quantum techniques. Accurate definitions are given and thorough analysis is accomplished for the quantum probabilities describing the choice between…
Quantum Mechanics, the physical theory describing the microworld, represents one of science's greatest triumphs. It lies at the root of all modern digital technologies and offers unparalleled correspondence between prediction and…
In this letter, we point to three widely accepted challenges that the quantum theory, quantum information, and quantum foundations communities are currently facing: indeterminism, the semantics of conditional probabilities, and the spooky…
In a series of papers, a many-minds interpretation of quantum theory has been developed. The aim in these papers is to present an explicit mathematical formalism which constitutes a complete theory compatible with relativistic quantum field…
A succinct statement and justification of all the principles necessary to understand and evaluate interpretations of quantum mechanics is given. These principles provide strong constraints on interpretations. They imply the particle-like…
Since its inception, quantum theory has been the subject of fierce interpretive controversy, which persists to this day. Disputed topics include the basic ontology and dynamics of the theory, the role (if any) of measurement, the meaning of…
Quantum theory can be understood as pointing to an ontology of relations. I observe that this reading of quantum mechanics is supported by the ubiquity of relationality in contemporary fundamental physics, including in classical mechanics,…
Based on a clear ontology of material individuals, we analyze in detail the factual semantics of quantum theory, and argue that the basic mathematical formalism of quantum theory is just okay with (a certain form of ) realism and that it is…
This paper addresses the central question of what a coherent concept of probability might look like that would do justice to both classical probability theory, axiomatized by Kolmogorov, and quantum theory. At a time when quanta are…
The best mathematical arguments against a realistic interpretation of quantum mechanics - that gives definite but partially unknown values to all observables - are analysed and shown to be based on reasoning that is not compelling. This…