Related papers: Decoherent Histories and Realism
We critically evaluate the treatment of the notion of measurement in the Consistent Histories approach to quantum mechanics. We find such a treatment unsatisfactory because it relies, often implicitly, on elements external to those provided…
A recent claim by Bassi and Ghirardi that the consistent (decoherent) histories approach cannot provide a realistic interpretation of quantum theory is shown to be based upon a misunderstanding of the single-framework rule: they have…
Modal interpretations of quantum mechanics assign definite properties to physical systems and specify single-time joint probabilities of these properties. We show that a natural extension, applying to properties at several times, can be…
The quantum theory of decoherence plays an important role in a pragmatist interpretation of quantum theory. It governs the descriptive content of claims about values of physical magnitudes and offers advice on when to use quantum…
We sketch a quantum mechanical framework for the universe as a whole. Within that framework we propose a program for describing the ultimate origin in quantum cosmology of the quasiclassical domain of familiar experience and for…
I briefly review the ''decohering histories'' or ''consistent histories'' formulation of quantum theory, due to Griffiths, Omnes, and Gell-Mann and Hartle (and the subject of my graduate work with George Sudarshan). I also sift through the…
We introduce a condition for the strong decoherence of a set of alternative histories of a closed quantum-mechanical system such as the universe. The condition applies, for a pure initial state, to sets of homogeneous histories that are…
Nonnegative probabilities that obey the sum rules may be assigned to a much wider family of sets of histories than decohering histories. The resulting {\it linearly positive histories} avoid the highly restrictive decoherence conditions and…
We use the decoherent histories approach to quantum theory to derive the form of an effective theory describing the coupling of classical and quantum variables. The derivation is carried out for a system consisting of a large particle…
This paper explores the possibility that an exactly decoherent set of histories may be constructed from an approximately decoherent set by small distortions of the operators characterizing the histories. In particular, for the case of…
A pedagogical introduction is given to the quantum mechanics of closed systems, most generally the universe as a whole. Quantum mechanics aims at predicting the probabilities of alternative coarse-grained time histories of a closed system.…
In response to a recent rebuttal of [1] presented in [2], we defend the claim that the Consistent Histories formulation of quantum mechanics does not solve the measurement problem. In order to do so, we argue that satisfactory solutions to…
In the decoherent histories approach to quantum theory, attention focuses on the conditions under which probabilities may be assigned to sets of quantum histories. A variety of conditions have been proposed, but the most important one is…
The quantum mechanics of closed systems such as the universe is formulated using an extension of familiar probability theory that incorporates negative probabilities. Probabilities must be positive for sets of alternative histories that are…
In this work a generalization of the consistent histories approach to quantum mechanics is presented. We first critically review the consistent histories approach to nonrelativistic quantum mechanics in a mathematically rigorous way and…
We use the decoherent histories approach to quantum theory to compute the probability of a non-relativistic particle crossing $x=0$ during an interval of time. For a system consisting of a single non-relativistic particle, histories…
The theory of decoherent histories allows one to talk of the behavior of quantum systems in the absence of measurement. This paper generalizes the idea of decoherent histories to arbitrary open system operations and proposes experimentally…
We review recent progress in understanding the arrival time problem in quantum mechanics, from the point of view of the decoherent histories approach to quantum theory. We begin by discussing the arrival time problem, focussing in…
We review the application of the consistent (or decoherent) histories formulation of quantum theory to canonical loop quantum cosmology. Conventional quantum theory relies crucially on "measurements" to convert unrealized quantum…
Quantum decoherence plays a pivotal role in the dynamical description of the quantum-to-classical transition and is the main impediment to the realization of devices for quantum information processing. This paper gives an overview of the…