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arXiv:1607.02364 · Physics Essays

Delayed choice, complementarity, entanglement and measurement

Hervé Zwirn C

Published Sep 15, 2017• 13 citations

Abstract

It is well known that Wheeler proposed several delayed choice experiments in order to show the impossibility to speak of the way a quantum system behaves before being detected. In a double-slit experiment, when do photons decide to travel by one way or by two ways? Delayed choice experiments seem to indicate that, strangely, it is possible to change the decision of the photons until the very last moment before they are detected. This led Wheeler to his famous sentence: No elementary quantum phenomenon is a phenomenon until it is a registered phenomenon, brought to a close by an irreversible act of amplification. Nevertheless some authors wrote that backward in time effects were needed to explain these results. I will show that in delayed choice experiments involving only one particle, a simple explanation is possible without invoking any backward in time effect. Delayed choice experiments involving entangled particles such as the so called quantum eraser can also be explained without invoking any backward in time effect but I will argue that these experiments cannot be accounted for so simply because they rise the whole problem of knowing what a measurement and a collapse are. A previously presented interpretation, Convivial Solipsism, is a natural framework for giving a simple explanation of these delayed choice experiments with entangled particles. In this paper, I show how Convivial Solipsism helps clarifying the puzzling questions raised by the collapse of the wave function of entangled systems.

DOI: 10.4006/0836-1398-30.3.281

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It is well known that Wheeler proposed several delayed choice experiments in order to show the impossibility to speak of the way a quantum system behaves before being detected. In a double-slit experiment, when do photons decide to travel by one way or by two ways? Delayed choice experiments seem to indicate that, strangely, it is possible to change the decision of the photons until the very last moment before they are detected. This led Wheeler to his famous sentence: No elementary quantum phenomenon is a phenomenon until it is a registered phenomenon, brought to a close by an irreversible act of amplification. Nevertheless some authors wrote that backward in time effects were needed to explain these results. I will show that in delayed choice experiments involving only one particle, a simple explanation is possible without invoking any backward in time effect. Delayed choice experiments involving entangled particles such as the so called quantum eraser can also be explained without invoking any backward in time effect but I will argue that these experiments cannot be accounted for so simply because they rise the whole problem of knowing what a measurement and a collapse are. A previously presented interpretation, Convivial Solipsism, is a natural framework for giving a simple explanation of these delayed choice experiments with entangled particles. In this paper, I show how Convivial Solipsism helps clarifying the puzzling questions raised by the collapse of the wave function of entangled systems.

Abstract Wheeler proposed the "Delayed-Choice" Double-Slit Experiment. Some scholars believe that the quantum delayed eraser experiments reveals Wheeler's unmeasurable phenomenon. However, all quantum delayed eraser experiments involve non-locality between entangled photon pairs, causing the timing relationship between events on the idler path and events on the signal path to not necessarily represent the timing relationship between the correspond events on the signal path. In the quantum delayed eraser experiments, the time distinguishing the path passing through the double-slit on the signal path is when they pass through the slits. Therefore, the quantum delayed eraser experimentsdoes not adhere to the condition in Wheeler's "Delayed-Choice" Double-Slit Experiment, which need the distinction of the photons passing through the double-slit is done after the formation of the fringe pattern. The results of the quantum delayed eraser experimentsdo not exhibit the unmeasured phenomenon of Wheeler's "Delayed-Choice" Double-Slit Experiment.This paper proposes a method that eliminates the non-locality effects of entangled photons without using entangled photon pairs. By dividing the route of photons passing through the double-slit into two routes and verifying the fringe pattern based on the number of photons on the two routes, Wheeler's notion of an unmeasured phenomenon becomes measurable, thus providing a revelation method of the unmeasured phenomenon in Wheeler's "Delayed-Choice" Double-Slit Experiment.

Abstract Wheeler proposed the "Delayed-Choice" Double-Slit Experiment. Perhaps the quantum delayed eraser experiments revealed Wheeler's unmeasurable phenomenon. However, all quantum delayed eraser experiments involve non-locality between entangled photon pairs, causing the timing relationship between events on the idler path and events on the signal path to not necessarily represent the timing relationship between the correspond events on the signal path. In the quantum delayed eraser experiments, the time distinguishing the path passing through the double-slit on the signal path is when they pass through the slits. Therefore, the quantum delayed eraser experiments do not adhere to the condition in Wheeler's "Delayed-Choice" Double-Slit Experiment, which need the distinction of the photons passing through the double-slit is done after the formation of the fringe pattern. The results of the quantum delayed eraser experiments do not exhibit the unmeasured phenomenon of Wheeler's "Delayed-Choice" Double-Slit Experiment. This paper proposes a method that eliminates the non-locality effects of entangled photons without using entangled photon pairs. By dividing the route of photons passing through the double-slit into two routes and verifying the fringe pattern based on the number of photons on the two routes, Wheeler's notion of an unmeasured phenomenon becomes measurable, thus providing a revelation method of the unmeasured phenomenon in Wheeler's "Delayed-Choice" Double-Slit Experiment.

The delayed-choice experiments of the type introduced by Wheeler and extended by Englert, Scully, Süssmann and Walther (ESSW) (1992 Z. Naturf. a 47 1175–86), and others, have formed a rich area for investigating the puzzling behaviour of particles undergoing quantum interference. The surprise provided by the original delayed-choice experiment led Wheeler to the conclusion that 'no phenomenon is a phenomenon until it is an observed phenomenon', a radical explanation which implied that 'the past has no existence except as it is recorded in the present'. However Bohm et al (1985 Nature 315 294–97) have shown that the Bohm interpretation (BI) gives a straightforward account of the behaviour of the particle without resorting to such a radical explanation. The subsequent modifications of this experiment led both Aharonov and Vaidman (1996 Bohmian Mechanics and Quantum Theory: An Appraisal ed J T Cushing, A Fine and S Goldstein (Dordrecht: Kluwer) pp 141–54) and ESSW to conclude that the resulting Bohm-type trajectories in these new situations produce unacceptable properties. For example, if a cavity is placed in one arm of the interferometer, it will be excited by a particle travelling down the other arm. In other words, it is the particle that does not go through the cavity that gives up its energy! If this analysis is correct, this behaviour would be truly bizarre and could only be explained by an extreme non-local transfer of energy that is even stronger than that required in an Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen (EPR)-type process. In this paper, we show that this conclusion is not correct and that if the BI is used correctly, it gives a local explanation, which actually corresponds exactly to the standard quantum mechanics explanation offered by ESSW.

The delayed-choice thought experiment proposed by Wheeler has been demonstrated over the last several decades for the wave-particle duality of a single photon. The delayed-choice quantum eraser proposed by Scully and Druhl has also been intensively studied for the violation of the cause-effect relation of a single photon as well as a pair of entangled photons in an interferometric system. Here, a coherence interpretation is conducted for the nonlocal realism of the space-like separated photons observed in Phys. Rev. Lett. 84, 1 (2000). As a result, coherence solutions of the observed nonlocal fringes are deterministically derived from coincidence detection-caused selective measurements, where the resulting product-basis superposition becomes the origin of the otherwise quantum mystery of the nonlocal fringes. For this, a fixed sum-phase relation between entangled photons is a prerequisite, which cannot be explained by conventional particle nature-based quantum mechanics.