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Steven Sagona-Stophel
Fri Mar 17 2023 09:54:12 (23 hours)
# 1.
We propose a set of simple quantum optics experiments that test for an entirely new domain of physical laws that govern how an individual’s conscious experience traverses the multiverse within Everett’s many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. These experiments imply an exception to the Born rule in a proposed ”observer-specific” reference frame. These experiments must be done by you, the reader. If it is performed by anyone else, other than you, the reader, you will observe that the person performing the experiment will observe an outcome that is not special, interesting, or different from what is already known about quantum mechanics. To the best of our knowledge, this would be the first ever modern experiment that is only meaningful if the experiment is performed by you, the reader, and cannot be inferred from the results of another experimenter. Therefore, since each individual must perform this test on his or her own, we outline a set of real experiments that can be easily performed such that as many people as possible can individually verify this for themselves. We do not know or specify what specific physical laws exist within this ”observer-specific” domain, but come up with a number of different tests to cover as many theories as possible.
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physics.hist-ph updates on arXiv.org
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Henrik Zinkernagel
Fri Mar 17 2023 09:54:12 (23 hours)
# 2.
This essay explores the relations between aesthetics and motivation, primarily in quantum physics, focusing on the notions of play, beauty, and the joy of insight. The motivating role of these notions is examined both historically among the quantum pioneers and contemporarily, based on a series of interviews, among physicists associated with the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen.
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Sofia Wechsler
Fri Mar 17 2023 09:54:11 (23 hours)
# 3.
A. Peres constructed an example of particles entangled in the state of spin singlet. He claimed to have obtained the CHSH inequality and concluded that the violation of this inequality shows that in a measurement in which some variables are tested, other variables, not tested, have no defined value. In the present paper is proved that the correct conclusion of the violation of the CHSH inequality is different. It is proved that the classical calculus of probabilities of test results, obeying the Kolmogorov axioms, is unfit for the quantum formalism, dominated by probability amplitudes.
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Stefano Gogioso, Nicola Pinzani
Fri Mar 17 2023 09:53:53 (23 hours)
# 4.
We provide a unified operational framework for the study of causality, non-locality and contextuality, in a fully device-independent and theory-independent setting. We define causaltopes, our chosen portmanteau of “causal polytopes”, for arbitrary spaces of input histories and arbitrary choices of input contexts. We show that causaltopes are obtained by slicing simpler polytopes of conditional probability distributions with a set of causality equations, which we fully characterise. We provide efficient linear programs to compute the maximal component of an empirical model supported by any given sub-causaltope, as well as the associated causal fraction.
We introduce a notion of causal separability relative to arbitrary causal constraints. We provide efficient linear programs to compute the maximal causally separable component of an empirical model, and hence its causally separable fraction, as the component jointly supported by certain sub-causaltopes.
We study causal fractions and causal separability for several novel examples, including a selection of quantum switches with entangled or contextual control. In the process, we demonstrate the existence of “causal contextuality”, a phenomenon where causal inseparability is clearly correlated to, or even directly implied by, non-locality and contextuality.
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PRL: General Physics: Statistical and Quantum Mechanics, Quantum Information, etc.
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Ram Krishna Patra, Sahil Gopalkrishna Naik, Edwin Peter Lobo, Samrat Sen, Govind Lal Sidhardh, Mir Alimuddin, and Manik Banik
Thu Mar 16 2023 18:00:00 (1 day)
# 5.
Author(s): Ram Krishna Patra, Sahil Gopalkrishna Naik, Edwin Peter Lobo, Samrat Sen, Govind Lal Sidhardh, Mir Alimuddin, and Manik Banik
The principle of information causality, proposed as a generalization of no signaling principle, has efficiently been applied to outcast beyond quantum correlations as unphysical. In this Letter, we show that this principle, when utilized properly, can provide physical rationale toward structural der…
[Phys. Rev. Lett. 130, 110202] Published Thu Mar 16, 2023
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physics.hist-ph updates on arXiv.org
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Barak Shoshany, Jared Wogan
Thu Mar 16 2023 09:04:21 (2 days)
# 6.
In a previous paper, we showed that a class of time travel paradoxes which cannot be resolved using Novikov’s self-consistency conjecture can be resolved by assuming the existence of multiple histories or parallel timelines. However, our proof was obtained using a simplistic toy model, which was formulated using contrived laws of physics. In the present paper we define and analyze a new model of time travel paradoxes, which is more compatible with known physics. This model consists of a traversable Morris-Thorne wormhole time machine in 3+1 spacetime dimensions. We define the spacetime topology and geometry of the model, calculate the geodesics of objects passing through the time machine, and prove that this model inevitably leads to paradoxes which cannot be resolved using Novikov’s conjecture, but can be resolved using multiple histories. An open-source simulation of our new model using Mathematica is available for download on GitHub. We also provide additional arguments against the Novikov self-consistency conjecture by considering two new paradoxes, the switch paradox and the password paradox, for which assuming self-consistency inevitably leads to counter-intuitive consequences. Our new results provide more substantial support to our claim that if time travel is possible, then multiple histories or parallel timelines must also be possible.
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PhilSci-Archive: No conditions. Results ordered -Date Deposited.
Thu Mar 16 2023 01:30:51 (2 days)
# 7.
Gao, Shan (2023) Is decoherence necessary for the emergence of many worlds? [Preprint]
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Thu Mar 16 2023 01:26:20 (2 days)
# 8.
Barrett, Jeffrey A. and Goldbring, Isaac (2023) A Nonstandard Formulation of Bohmian Mechanics. [Preprint]
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physics.hist-ph updates on arXiv.org
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Barak Shoshany, Zipora Stober
Wed Mar 15 2023 09:00:24 (3 days)
# 9.
For time travel to be consistent with the known laws of physics, the resulting paradoxes must be resolved. It has been suggested that parallel timelines (a.k.a. multiple histories) may provide a resolution. However, so far, a concrete mechanism by which parallel timelines can be created has never been satisfactorily formulated. In this paper we propose such a mechanism within the framework of unmodified quantum mechanics, also known as the Everett or “many-worlds” interpretation. The timelines in our model are emergent, like the “worlds” of the Everett interpretation; they are created by quantum entanglement between the time machine and the environment. Therefore, we call them “entangled timelines” or E-CTCs. As the entanglement gradually spreads out to additional systems, the timelines spread out as well, providing a local and well-defined alternative to the naive “branching timelines” picture often presented in the literature. Our model differs from Deutsch’s familiar D-CTC model and improves upon it in several important ways.
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physics.hist-ph updates on arXiv.org
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Stuart Bartlett, Michael L Wong
Wed Mar 15 2023 09:00:23 (3 days)
# 10.
We survey some of the philosophical challenges and pitfalls within origins research. Several of these challenges exhibit circularities, paradoxes, or anthropic biases. We present origins approaches in terms of three broad categories: unlikely (life’s origin was a chance event), construction (life’s origin was a stepwise series of synthesis and assembly processes), and emergence (life was always an amalgam of many parallel processes from which the living state emerged as a natural outcome of physical driving forces). We critically examine some of the founding and possibly misleading assumptions in these categories. Such assumptions need not be detrimental to scientific progress as long as their limits are respected. We conclude by attempting to concisely state the most significant enigmas still remaining in the origins field and suggest routes to solve them.
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Barbara Drossel
Tue Mar 14 2023 09:37:36 (4 days)
# 11.
It is often claimed that the fundamental laws of physics are deterministic and time-symmetric and that therefore our experience of the passage of time is an illusion. This paper will critically discuss these claims and show that they are based on the misconception that the laws of physics are an exact and complete description of nature. I will argue that all supposedly fundamental deterministic and time-symmetric laws have their limitations and are supplemented by stochastic and irreversible elements. In fact, a deterministic description of a system is valid only as long as interactions with the rest of the world can be ignored. The most famous example is the quantum measurement process that occurs when a quantum system interacts with a macroscopic environment such as a measurement apparatus. This environment determines in a top-down way the possible outcomes of the measurement and their probabilities. I will argue that more generally the possible events that can occur in a system and their probabilities are the result of top-down influences from the wider context. In this way the microscopic level of a system is causally open to influences from the macroscopic environment. In conclusion, indeterminism and irreversibility are the result of a system being embedded in a wider context.
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Ovidiu Cristinel Stoica
Tue Mar 14 2023 09:37:34 (4 days)
# 12.
Hilbert-Space Fundamentalism (HSF) states that the only fundamental structures are the quantum state vector and the Hamiltonian, and from them everything else emerge uniquely, including the 3D-space, a preferred basis, and a preferred factorization of the Hilbert space.
In this article it is shown that whenever such a structure emerges from the Hamiltonian and the state vector alone, if it is physically relevant, it is not unique.
Moreover, HSF leads to strange effects like “passive” travel in time and in alternative realities, realized simply by passive transformations of the Hilbert space.
The results from this article affect all theories that adhere to HSF, whether they assume branching or state vector reduction (in particular the version of Everett’s Interpretation coined by Carroll and Singh “Mad-dog Everettianism”), various proposals based on decoherence, proposals that aim to describe everything by the quantum structure alone, and proposals that spacetime emerges from a purely quantum theory of gravity.
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Michal P. Heller
Tue Mar 14 2023 08:00:00 (4 days)
# 13.
Nature Physics, Published online: 14 March 2023; doi:10.1038/s41567-023-01955-2
The study of complexity of unitary transformations has become central to quantum information theory and, increasingly, quantum field theory and quantum gravity. A proof of how complexity grows with system size demonstrates the power of a geometric approach.
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Bruno Castro
Tue Mar 14 2023 08:00:00 (4 days)
# 14.
Nature Physics, Published online: 14 March 2023; doi:10.1038/s41567-023-01987-8
The physics of human reproduction
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PhilSci-Archive: No conditions. Results ordered -Date Deposited.
Tue Mar 14 2023 02:24:10 (4 days)
# 15.
Chen, Ruey-Lin and Hricko, Jonathon (2023) Experimental criteria for accessing reality: Perrin’s experimental demonstration of atoms and molecules. European Journal for Philosophy of Science, 13 (1). ISSN 1879-4912
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Sun Mar 12 2023 04:31:49 (6 days)
# 16.
Grimmer, Daniel (2023) The Pragmatic QFT Measurement Problem and the need for a Heisenberg-like Cut in QFT. [Preprint]
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Sun Mar 12 2023 04:31:03 (6 days)
# 17.
Bacelar Valente, Mario (2023) A note on the notion of now and time flow in special relativity. [Preprint]
