Related papers: Are Physical Theories Incommensurable?
The notion of quantum state plays a fundamental role within the Standard account of Quantum Mechanics (SQM) as established by Dirac and von Neumann during 1930s and up to the present. In this work we expose the deep inconsistencies that…
Some measurements in quantum mechanics disturb each other. This has puzzled physicists since the formulation of the theory, but only in recent decades has the incompatibility of measurements been analyzed in depth and detail, using the…
While philosophy of science is the study of problems of knowledge concerning science in general, there also exists - or should exist - a '' philosophy in science'' directed at finding out in what ways our actual scientific knowledge may…
I contrast two possible attitudes towards a given branch of physics: as inferential (i.e., as concerned with an agent's ability to make predictions given finite information), and as dynamical (i.e., as concerned with the dynamical equations…
Recent philosophical discussions about metaphysical indeterminacy have been substantiated with the idea that quantum mechanics, one of the most successful physical theories in the history of science, provides explicit instances of worldly…
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…
On the occasion of Carl Friedrich von Weizsaecker's 81st birthday, a colloquium was held on July 3, 1993. One of the topics was "The epistemological foundation of physics from Kant to von Weizsaecker". I took part in the discussion.…
This paper is a commentary on the foundational significance of the Clifton-Bub-Halvorson theorem characterizing quantum theory in terms of three information-theoretic constraints (Foundations of Physics 33, 1561-1591 (2003);…
The epistemological interpretation of quantum mechanics is still in an unacceptable status. This becomes obvious if looking on the variety of interpretations currently under discussion. However, the physical community together with…
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…
Why does such a successful theory like Quantum Mechanics have so many mysteries? The history of this theory is replete with dubious interpretations and controversies, and yet a knowledge of its predictions, however, contributed to the…
A variety of physical unknowables are discussed. Provable lack of physical omniscience, omnipredictability and omnipotence is derived by reduction to problems which are known to be recursively unsolvable. "Chaotic" symbolic dynamical…
Quantum Mechanics, almost 80 years after its arrival, is a well established and experimentally not falsified theory. It has predicted and explained a whole series of natural phenomena of a very delicate nature. But its interpretation has…
What is fundamentally quantum? We argue that most of the features, problems, and paradoxes -- such as the measurement problem, the Wigner's friend paradox and its proposed solutions, single particle nonlocality, and no-cloning -- allegedly…
How should we interpret physical theories, and especially quantum theory, if we drop the assumption that we should treat it as an exact description of the whole Universe? I expound and develop the claim that physics is about the study of…
Superconductivity is macroscopic quantum phenomenon. From force of habit most physicists pay no heed to a paradoxicality of this fact. Niels Bohr considered quantum mechanics as atomic physics and the paradoxical quantum principles may be…
One would not think that thought experiments could matter to nature, for they are a humble human device. Yet quantum mechanics very naturally frames thought experiments (as distinct from precisely defining what exists). They exemplify the…
It is argued that the traditional "realist" methodology of physics, according to which human concepts, laws and theories can grasp the essence of reality, is incompatible with the most fruitful interpretation of quantum formalism. The proof…
Frauchiger and Renner recently cast doubt on the universal applicability of Quantum Mechanics [1]. In the following, it is pointed out that their conclusion of one of three common-sense conditions, demanded for Quantum Mechanics, being…
In arXiv:0709.0483 Gunther and Samsonov outline a ``generalization'' of quantum mechanics that involves simultaneous consideration of Hermitian and non-Hermitian operators and promises to be ``capable to produce effects beyond those of…