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arXiv:1012.0992

Quantum Structures of a Model-Universe: Questioning the Everett Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics

J. Jeknić-Dugić, M. Dugić, A. Francom

Published Dec 5, 2010• 2 citations
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Abstract

Our objective is to demonstrate an inconsistency with both the original and modern Everettian Many Worlds Interpretations. We do this by examining two important corollaries of the universally valid quantum mechanics in the context of the Quantum Brownian Motion (QBM) model: "Entanglement Relativity" and the "parallel occurrence of decoherence." We conclude that the highlighted inconsistency demands that either there is a privileged spatial structure of the QBM model universe or that the Everettian Worlds are not physically real.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.1012.0992

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Our objective is to demonstrate an inconsistency with both the original and modern Everettian Many Worlds Interpretations. We do this by examining two important corollaries of the universally valid quantum mechanics in the context of the Quantum Brownian Motion (QBM) model: "Entanglement Relativity" and the "parallel occurrence of decoherence." We conclude that the highlighted inconsistency demands that either there is a privileged spatial structure of the QBM model universe or that the Everettian Worlds are not physically real.
abstract: This thesis attempts to explain Everettian quantum mechanics from the ground up, such that those with little to no experience in quantum physics can understand it. First, we introduce the history of quantum theory, and some concepts that make up the framework of quantum physics. Through these concepts, we reveal why interpretations are necessary to map the quantum world onto our classical world. We then introduce the Copenhagen interpretation, and how many-worlds differs from it. From there, we dive into the concepts of entanglement and decoherence, explaining how worlds branch in an Everettian universe, and how an Everettian universe can appear as our classical observed world. From there, we attempt to answer common questions about many-worlds and discuss whether there are philosophical ramifications to believing such a theory. Finally, we look at whether the many-worlds interpretation can be proven, and why one might choose to believe it. (abstract)
The problem of measurement taken at face value shows clearly that there is an inconsistency inside the quantum formalism.The phenomenon of decoherence is often presented as a solution to it.A widely debated question is to decide between two different interpretations.The first one is to consider that the decoherence process has the effect to actually project a superposed state into one of its classically interpretable component, hence doing the same job as the reduction postulate.For the second one, decoherence is only a way to show why no macroscopic superposed state can be observed and so, to explain the classical appearance of the macroscopic world, while the quantum entanglement between the system, the apparatus and the environment never disappears.In this case, explaining why only one single definite outcome is observed remains to do.In this paper, we examine arguments for and against both interpretations and defend a position according to which the outcome that is observed is relative to the observer in close parallel to the Everett interpretation.
Abstract The modern Everett interpretation of quantum mechanics describes an emergent multiverse. The goal of this paper is to provide a perspicuous characterisation of how the multiverse emerges making use of a recent account of (weak) ontological emergence. This will be cashed out with a case study that identifies decoherence as the mechanism for emergence. The greater metaphysical clarity enables the rebuttal of critiques due to Baker (2007) and Dawid and Thébault (2015) that cast the emergent multiverse ontology as incoherent; responses are also offered to challenges to the Everettian approach from Maudlin (2010) and Monton (2013).
Everett's relative-state construction in quantum theory has never been satisfactorily expressed in the Heisenberg picture. What one might have expected to be a straightforward process was impeded by conceptual and technical problems that we solve here. The result is a construction which, unlike Everett's one in the Schrödinger picture, makes manifest the locality of Everettian multiplicity, its inherently approximative nature and its origin in certain kinds of entanglement and locally inaccessible information. (By Everettian , we are referring not only to Everett's own work, but also to versions of quantum theory that elaborate and refine his. The notion of relative states first appeared in Everett (Everett 1973 In The many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics (eds BS DeWitt, N Graham)). We are proposing a formalism for relative states that is more detailed and more illuminating than Everett's.) Our construction also allows us to give a more precise definition of an Everett ‘universe’, under which it is fully quantum, not quasi-classical, and we compare the Everettian decomposition of a quantum state with the foliation of a space–time.
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