The theorem of Pusey, Barrett, and Rudolph proves that different quantum states describe different physical realities. Their proof is based on the construction of entanglement measurement bases of two, and more than two qbits. In this note, I show that a two-qubit entanglement base is sufficient for a general proof.
The analysis of Pusey, Barrett and Rudolph aims to show there can be no objective physical reality which underlies, and is more general than, the state vector. But there appears to be a gap in their reasoning. To show their result, they use entangled states of independent systems. However, no specific experimental arrangement to detect these entangled states has been proposed. Thus their argument as it stands does not fully show there is a detectable conflict between the predictions of quantum mechanics and the existence of an underlying reality. And it is not clear that one can devise the necessary measuring device.
Towards the end of 2011, Pusey, Barrett and Rudolph derived a theorem that aimed to show that the quantum state must be ontic (a state of reality) in a broad class of realist approaches to quantum theory. This result attracted a lot of attention and controversy. The aim of this review article is to review the background to the Pusey–Barrett–Rudolph Theorem, to provide a clear presentation of the theorem itself, and to review related work that has appeared since the publication of the Pusey–Barrett–Rudolph paper. In particular, this review: Explains what it means for the quantum state to be ontic or epistemic (a state of knowledge); Reviews arguments for and against an ontic interpretation of the quantum state as they existed prior to the Pusey–Barrett–Rudolph Theorem; Explains why proving the reality of the quantum state is a very strong constraint on realist theories in that it would imply many of the known no-go theorems, such as Bell's Theorem and the need for an exponentially large ontic state space; Provides a comprehensive presentation of the Pusey–Barrett–Rudolph Theorem itself, along with subsequent improvements and criticisms of its assumptions; Reviews two other arguments for the reality of the quantum state: the first due to Hardy and the second due to Colbeck and Renner, and explains why their assumptions are less compelling than those of the Pusey–Barrett–Rudolph Theorem; Reviews subsequent work aimed at ruling out stronger notions of what it means for the quantum state to be epistemic and points out open questions in this area. The overall aim is not only to provide the background needed for the novice in this area to understand the current status, but also to discuss often overlooked subtleties that should be of interest to the experts. Quanta 2014; 3: 67–155.
This paper explores the philosophical as well as the physical arguments made by Matthew Pusey, Jonathan Barrett and Terry Rudolph in their recently published article on the reality of the quantum state in order to attain a full understanding of the statements they make in their article. This is essential because not even all respondents to the article agree on how to interpret the article. In their article Pusey, Barrett and Rudolph present a no-go theorem; they show that a particular situation is, according to quantum theory, not physically possible if one were to be psi-epistemic about it. They argue that for this particular situation, or thought-experiment, the psi-epistemic interpretation makes predictions that are inconsistent with those predictions made by quantum theory itself.
Abstract The Pusey–Barrett–Rudolph theorem has recently provoked a lot of discussion regarding the reality of the quantum state. In this article we focus on a property called antidistinguishability, which is a main component in constructing the proof for the PBR theorem. In particular we study algebraic conditions for a set of pure quantum states to be antidistinguishable, and a novel sufficient condition is presented. We also discuss a more general criterion which can be used to show that the sufficient condition is not necessary. Lastly, we consider how many quantum states needs to be added into a set of pure quantum states in order to make the set antidistinguishable. It is shown that in the case of qubit states the answer is one, while in the general but finite dimensional case the answer is at most n , where n is the size of the original set.
The Pusey--Barrett--Rudolph (PBR) theorem is commonly taken to establish that a pure quantum state represents a physical property of the system to which it is assigned, rather than merely encoding knowledge. In this work, I distinguish between state-first and dynamics-first physical theories, and argue that this reading presupposes the former. These two types of theories support different approaches to causal explanation, and one of PBR's stated assumptions depends on the state-first approach. Using a recent interpretation of quantum theory as a concrete example, I show how a dynamics-first theory can explain the PBR correlations while maintaining a broadly epistemic reading of quantum states. I conclude that the PBR theorem supports a dilemma: either the quantum state is part of reality, or reality is not fundamentally built out of states.
In this paper, a proof similar to the Pusey-Barrett-Rudolph (PBR) theorem is given to prove that time in quantum theory is not epistemic but has ontological reality. For this, we first discuss how time can be encoded as an intrinsic property of a quantum system. We prepare a quantum state containing time as an intrinsic property and show by a PBR-type proof that time cannot be an epistemic notion. In fact, the PBR theorem implies an ontic notion of time. Indeed, if the quantum state is a physical property, then quantum state reduction is a physical process involving information destruction. In this case, quantum probabilities are intrinsic probabilities without epistemic origin, and they generate a genuinely new sequence of events. This novelty introduced by quantum probabilities can be interpreted as time.