Related papers: Textbook myths about early atomic models
A unifying principle explaining the numerical bounds of quantum correlations remains elusive despite the efforts devoted to identifying it. Here we show that these bounds are indeed not exclusive to quantum theory: for any abstract…
Quantum mechanics has maintained over the years the reputation of being "the most obscure theory." It works perfectly well, but nobody seems to know why. It has been argued that the difficulty in understanding quantum theory is our failed…
The non-classical features of quantum mechanics are reproduced using models constructed with a classical theory - general relativity. The inability to define complete initial data consistently and independently of future measurements,…
An apparent paradox in Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity, known as a Thomas precession rotation in atomic physics, has been verified experimentally in a number of ways. However, somewhat surprisingly, it has not yet been demonstrated…
Traditional textbook explanations of the Compton effect treat the photon electron interaction as a particle collision. This explanation is a pedagogical disaster, implying that sometimes interactions are particle-like whereas quantum…
Quantum physics, which describes the strange behavior of light and matter at the smallest scales, is one of the most successful descriptions of reality, yet it is notoriously inaccessible. Here we provide an approachable explanation of…
Formulations of quantum mechanics can be characterized as realistic, operationalist, or a combination of the two. In this paper a realistic theory is defined as describing a closed system entirely by means of entities and concepts…
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…
Thermodynamics originated in the need to understand novel technologies developed by the Industrial Revolution. However, over the centuries the description of engines, refrigerators, thermal accelerators, and heaters has become so abstract…
We present critical arguments against individual interpretation of Bohr's complementarity and Heisenberg's uncertainty principles. Statistical interpretation of these principles is discussed in the contextual framework. We support the…
Students are taught several models of conductivity, both at the introductory and the advanced level. From early macroscopic models of current flow in circuits, through the discussion of microscopic particle descriptions of electrons flowing…
In a recent preprint [1] (arXiv:2503.05693), Tindall et al. presented impressive classical simulations of quantum dynamics using tensor networks. Their methods represent a significant improvement in the classical state of the art, and in…
At the primary level of reality as described by quantum field theory, a fundamental particle like an electron represents a stable, discrete, propagating excited state of its underlying quantum field. QFT also tells us that the lowest vacuum…
I suggest that the common unease with taking quantum mechanics as a fundamental description of nature (the "measurement problem") could derive from the use of an incorrect notion, as the unease with the Lorentz transformations before…
The world of mathematics is often considered abstract, with its symbols, concepts, and topics appearing unrelated to physical objects. However, it is important to recognize that the development of mathematics is fundamentally influenced by…
We still lack any consensus about what one is actually talking about as one uses quantum mechanics. There is a gap between the abstract terms in which the theory is couched and the phenomena the theory enables each of us to account for so…
The goal of these lectures is to introduce readers with a basic knowledge of undergraduate physics (specifically non-relativistic quantum mechanics, special relativity, and electromagnetism) to the `current theory of everything': the…
When a mountaineer is ascending one of the great peaks of the Himalayas she knows that an entirely new vista awaits her at the top, whose ramifications will be known only after she gets there. Her immediate goal though, is to tackle the…
In the standard model of cosmology, the universe is described by a Robertson-Walker spacetime, while its matter/energy content is modeled by a perfect fluid with three components corresponding to matter/dust, radiation and a cosmological…
The Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, which first took shape in Bohr's landmark 1928 paper on complementarity, remains an enigma. Although many physicists are skeptical about the necessity of Bohr's philosophical conclusions,…