Abstract
We examine two quite different threads in Pitowsky’s approach to the measurement problem that are sometimes associated with his writings. One thread is an attempt to understand quantum mechanics as a probability theory of physical reality. This thread appears in almost all of Pitowsky’s papers (see for example 2003, 2007). We focus here on the ideas he developed jointly with Jeffrey Bub in their paper ‘Two Dogmas About Quantum Mechanics’ (2010) (See also: Bub (1977, 2007, 2016, 2020); Pitowsky (2003, 2007)). In this paper they propose an interpretation in which the quantum probabilities are objective chances determined by the physics of a genuinely indeterministic universe. The other thread is sometimes associated with Pitowsky’s earlier writings on quantum mechanics as a Bayesian theory of quantum probability (Pitowsky 2003) in which the quantum state seems to be a credence function tracking the experience of agents betting on the outcomes of measurements. An extreme form of this thread is the so-called Bayesian approach to quantum mechanics. We argue that in both threads the measurement problem is solved by implicitly adding structure to Hilbert space. In the Bub-Pitowsky approach we show that the claim that decoherence gives rise to an effective Boolean probability space requires adding structure to Hilbert space. With respect to the Bayesian approach to quantum mechanics, we show that it too requires adding structure to Hilbert space, and (moreover) it leads to an extreme form of idealism.
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Notes
- 1.
Everett’s (1957) interpretation of quantum mechanics has a similar attempt in this respect.
- 2.
- 3.
- 4.
The ‘no signaling’ principle asserts, roughly, that the marginal probabilities of events associated with a quantum system are independent of the particular set of mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive events associated with any other system.
- 5.
Or Einstein’s principle of relativity and the light postulate.
- 6.
- 7.
For decoherence theory, and references, see e.g., Joos et al. (2003).
- 8.
Interactions never begin, so state (1) (which is a product state) should be replaced with a state in which Alice + electron are (weakly) entangled; otherwise the dynamics would not be reversible.
- 9.
In discrete models, both | ψ↑↓⟩ and | E ±(t)⟩ are states of the form: \( \prod_{i=1}^N\mid \left.{\mu}_i\right\rangle \) defined in the corresponding multi-dimensional Hilbert spaces.
- 10.
In statistical mechanics, here is an analogous scenario: the phase space of the universe can be partitioned into infinitely many sets corresponding to infinitely many macrovariables. Some of these partitions exhibit certain regularities, for example, the partition to the thermodynamic sets which human observers are sensitive to, exhibit the thermodynamic regularities; while other partitions to which human observers are not sensitive, although they are equally real exhibit other regularities and may even be anomalous (that is, exhibit no regularities at all). We call this scenario in statistical mechanics Ludwig’s problem (see Hemmo and Shenker 2012, 2016). But one can explain by straightforward physical facts why (presumably) human observers experience the thermodynamic sets and regularities but not the equally existing other sets (although it might be that in our experience some other sets also appear). This case too is dis-analogous to the basis-symmetry in quantum mechanics, from which the problem of no preferred basis follows.
- 11.
- 12.
- 13.
For the role of decoherence in the Bayesian approach and its relation to Dutch-book consistency, see Fuchs and Scack (2012).
- 14.
- 15.
- 16.
These two roles are carried out by the mind at one shot (as it were), but analytically they are different.
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Acknowledgement
We thank Guy Hetzroni and Cristoph Lehner for comments on an earlier draft of this paper. This research was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (ISF), grant number 1114/18.
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Hemmo, M., Shenker, O. (2020). Quantum Mechanics as a Theory of Probability. In: Hemmo, M., Shenker, O. (eds) Quantum, Probability, Logic. Jerusalem Studies in Philosophy and History of Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-34316-3_15
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