Quantum reality: A pragmaticized neo-Kantian approach

Despite remarkable efforts, it remains notoriously difficult to equip quantum theory with a coherent ontology. Hence, Healey (2017, 12) has recently suggested that “quantum theory has no physical ontology and states no facts about physical objects or events”, and Fuchs et al. (2014, 752) similarly hold that “quantum mechanics itself does not deal directly with the objective world”. While intriguing, these positions either raise the question of how talk of ‘physical reality’ can even remain meaningful, or they must ultimately embrace a hidden variables-view, in tension with their original project. I here offer a neo-Kantian alternative. In particular, I will show how constitutive elements in the sense of Reichenbach (1920) and Friedman (1999, 2001) can be identified within quantum theory, through considerations of symmetries that allow the constitution of a ‘quantum reality’, without invoking any notion of a radically mind-independent reality. The resulting conception will inherit elements from pragmatist and ‘QBist’ approaches, but also differ from them in crucial respects. Furthermore, going beyond the Friedmanian program, I will show how non-fundamental and approximate symmetries can be relevant for identifying constitutive principles.     

量子测量中的多世界理论及其意义分析

多世界解释理论作为量子测量解释的一种,已经存在了半个多世纪。它从相关态解释开始,经过漫长的沉默期、发展期逐渐成为主流物理学家和哲学家关注的热点。该理论的确立为量子测量问题提出了一致的解释,更为量子理论谋求到坚实的、另类的实在论基础。它捍卫了科学理论的真理性,并揭示了现代量子理论的发展趋势。本文分析多世界理论的哲学根源,概述其在量子测量中的研究路径,探讨其哲学意义,期望有助于人们全面了解多世界理论。     

Can We Explain Thermodynamics By Quantum Decoherence?

Can we explain the laws of thermodynamics, in particular the irreversible increase of entropy, from the underlying quantum mechanical dynamics? Attempts based on classical dynamics have all failed. Albert (1994a,b; 2000) proposed a way to recover thermodynamics on a purely dynamical basis, using the quantum theory of the collapse of the wavefunction of Ghirardi, Rimini and Weber (1986). In this paper we propose an alternative way to explain thermodynamics within no-collapse interpretations of quantum mechanics. Our approach relies on the standard quantum mechanical models of environmental decoherence of open systems, e.g. Joos and Zeh (1985) and Zurek and Paz (1994).     

宏观极限下的量子动力学模型的退相干

本文利用位移算符的性质以及相干态的性质很方便地推导了量子动力学模型的相干项.同时推导出约化密度矩阵的非对角元为两个相干态的内积.最后,我们在两个特殊情况下实现了宏观极限下的退相干.     

Interpretation neutrality in the classical domain of quantum theory

I show explicitly how concerns about wave function collapse and ontology can be decoupled from the bulk of technical analysis necessary to recover localized, approximately Newtonian trajectories from quantum theory. In doing so, I demonstrate that the account of classical behavior provided by decoherence theory can be straightforwardly tailored to give accounts of classical behavior on multiple interpretations of quantum theory, including the Everett, de Broglie–Bohm and GRW interpretations. I further show that this interpretation-neutral, decoherence-based account conforms to a general view of inter-theoretic reduction in physics that I have elaborated elsewhere, which differs from the oversimplified picture that treats reduction as a matter of simply taking limits. This interpretation-neutral account rests on a general three-pronged strategy for reduction between quantum and classical theories that combines decoherence, an appropriate form of Ehrenfest׳s Theorem, and a decoherence-compatible mechanism for collapse. It also incorporates a novel argument as to why branch-relative trajectories should be approximately Newtonian, which is based on a little-discussed extension of Ehrenfest׳s Theorem to open systems, rather than on the more commonly cited but less germane closed-systems version. In the Conclusion, I briefly suggest how the strategy for quantum-classical reduction described here might be extended to reduction between other classical and quantum theories, including classical and quantum field theory and classical and quantum gravity.     

多世界解释VS哥本哈根解释

作为相关态解释的自然推论,量子测量的多世界解释理论从诞生以来即被边缘化。半个世纪以后该理论逐渐成为一个倍受争议和关注的理论热点,甚至也被称为新标准解释,这是值得深思的。本文详细探讨多世界解释对于哥本哈根解释的超越,重点分析多世界解释地位确立的原因。     

An axiomatic formulation of the Montevideo interpretation of quantum mechanics

We make a first attempt to axiomatically formulate the Montevideo interpretation of quantum mechanics. In this interpretation environmental decoherence is supplemented with loss of coherence due to the use of realistic clocks to measure time to solve the measurement problem. The resulting formulation is framed entirely in terms of quantum objects. Unlike in ordinary quantum mechanics, classical time only plays the role of an unobservable parameter. The formulation eliminates any privileged role of the measurement process giving an objective definition of when an event occurs in a system.     

Experimental : The double standard in the quantum-information approach to the foundations of quantum theory

Among the alternatives of non-relativistic quantum mechanics (NRQM) there are those that give different predictions than quantum mechanics in yet-untested circumstances, while remaining compatible with current empirical findings. In order to test these predictions, one must isolate one's system from environmental induced decoherence, which, on the standard view of NRQM, is the dynamical mechanism that is responsible for the ‘apparent’ collapse in open quantum systems. But while recent advances in condensed-matter physics may lead in the near future to experimental setups that will allow one to test the two hypotheses, namely genuine collapse vs. decoherence, hence make progress toward a solution to the quantum measurement problem, those philosophers and physicists who are advocating an information-theoretic approach to the foundations of quantum mechanics are still unwilling to acknowledge the empirical character of the issue at stake. Here I argue that in doing so they are displaying an unwarranted double standard.     

抛物势量子点电荷量子比特的消相干

通过求解能量的本征方程得出了抛物线性限制势下柱形量子点中电子的基态、激发态本征波函数及其本征能量,将基态、激发态二能级系统作为一个量子比特,利用费米黄金规则讨论了量子点受限长度对量子点消相干速率的影响,同时讨论了电子在空间概率密度分布的时间演化和振荡周期.数值计算结果表明,量子比特的消相干速率随受限长度的增加而减小,振荡周期随受限长度的增加而增加.电子的概率密度在空间呈周期性的变化.