Issue |
EPL
Volume 128, Number 5, December 2019
|
|
---|---|---|
Article Number | 50001 | |
Number of page(s) | 7 | |
Section | General | |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1209/0295-5075/128/50001 | |
Published online | 05 February 2020 |
A minimalist's view of quantum mechanics
Departmento de Química-Física, Universidad del País Vasco, UPV/EHU - Leioa, Spain and IKERBASQUE, Basque Foundation for Science - E-48013 Bilbao, Spain
Received: 18 September 2019
Accepted: 19 December 2019
We analyse a proposition which considers quantum theory as a mere tool for calculating probabilities for sequences of outcomes of observations made by an Observer, who him/herself remains outside the scope of the theory. Predictions are possible, provided a sequence includes at least two such observations. Complex valued probability amplitudes, each defined for an entire sequence of outcomes, are attributed to Observer's reasoning, and the problem of wave function's collapse is dismissed as a purely semantic one. Our examples include quantum “weak values”, and a simplified version of the “delayed quantum eraser”.
PACS: 03.65.Ta – Foundations of quantum mechanics; measurement theory / 03.65.Aa – Quantum systems with finite Hilbert space / 03.65.Ud – Entanglement and quantum nonlocality (e.g. EPR paradox, Bell's inequalities, GHZ states, etc.)
© 2020 The author(s)
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