Related papers: Bohr, objectivity, and "our experience": \`A propo…
The idea that wave-function collapse is a physical process stems from a misunderstanding of probability and the role it plays in quantum mechanics.
It is well known that Niels Bohr insisted on the necessity of classical concepts in the account of quantum phenomena. But there is little consensus concerning his reasons, and what he exactly meant by this. In this paper, I re-examine…
Understanding the quantum measurement problem is closely associated with understanding wave function collapse. Motivated by Breuer's claim that it is impossible for an observer to distinguish all states of a system in which it is contained,…
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…
In our quantum mechanics courses, measurement is usually taught in passing, as an ad-hoc procedure involving the ugly collapse of the wave function. No wonder we search for more satisfying alternatives to the Copenhagen interpretation. But…
The problem of measurement in quantum mechanics is that the quantum particle in the course of evolution, as described by the linear Schrodinger equation, exists in all of its possible states, but in measuring, the particle is always…
The Bohr and von Neumann views on the measurement process in quantum mechanics have been interpreted for a long time in somewhat controversial terms, often leading to misconceptions. On the basis of some textual analysis, I would like to…
An analysis has been performed of the theories and postulates advanced by von Neumann, London and Bauer, and Wigner, concerning the role that consciousness might play in the collapse of the wave function, which has become known as the…
We present the quantum measurement problem as a serious physics problem. Serious because without a resolution, quantum theory is not complete, as it does not tell how one should - in principle - perform measurements. It is physical in the…
The von Neumann attitude on such a deep interpretational question as the role of a human observer in order for the quantum description of measurement to be consistent has been long misrepresented. The large majority of the subsequent…
QBism is a novel interpretation of quantum mechanics. With its radical emphasis on the subject, QBism provides a welcome corrective to popular misrepresentations of the epistemological reflections of Niels Bohr, while Bohr, rightly…
After a summary of Bohr's views and their relation to Kant's theory of science, two fruitless lines of attack on the measurement problem are discussed: the way of the psi-ontologist and the way of the QBist. In the remainder of the paper…
The postulate of the collapse of the wave function stands between the microscopic, quantum world, and the macroscopic world. Because of this intermediate position, the collapse process cannot be examined with the formalism of the quantum…
We introduce a new and conceptually simple interpretation of quantum mechanics based on reduced density matrices of sub-systems from which the standard Copenhagen interpretation emerges as an effective description of macroscopically large…
Among several possibilities for what reality could be like in view of the empirical facts of quantum mechanics, one is provided by theories of spontaneous wave function collapse, the best known of which is the Ghirardi-Rimini-Weber (GRW)…
Bohmian mechanics and the Ghirardi-Rimini-Weber theory provide opposite resolutions of the quantum measurement problem: the former postulates additional variables (the particle positions) besides the wave function, whereas the latter…
The paper addresses the debate about the empirical status of particles versus wave functions in Bohmian quantum mechanics. It thereby clarifies questions and misconceptions about the role of the particles in the measurement process, the…
(A point-by-point response to a comment (quant-ph/0509130) on our paper (quant-ph/0509089) is added as Appendix C. We find the comment incorrect.) Einstein's criticism of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics is an important…
The conceptual problems in quantum mechanics -- related to the collapse of the wave function, the particle-wave duality, the meaning of measurement -- arise from the need to ascribe particle character to the wave function. As will be shown,…
The most peculiar, specifically quantum, features of quantum mechanics --- quantum nonlocality, indeterminism, interference of probabilities, quantization, wave function collapse during measurement --- are explained on a logical-geometrical…