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arXiv:1710.01318 · Journal of Mathematical Physics

Necessary conditions for extended noncontextuality in general sets of random variables

Bárbara Amaral, Cristhiano Duarte, Roberto I. Oliveira

Published Jul 1, 2018• 14 citations
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Abstract

In this paper, we explore the graph approach to contextuality to restate the extended definition of noncontextuality as given by Kujala et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 115, 150401 (2015)] using graph-theoretical terms. This extended definition avoids the assumption of the pre-sheaf or non-disturbance condition, which states that if two contexts overlap, then the marginal distribution obtained for the intersection must be the same, a restriction that will never be perfectly satisfied in real experiments. With this, we are able to derive necessary conditions for extended noncontextuality for any set of random variables based on the geometrical aspects of the graph approach, which can be tested directly with experimental data in any contextuality experiment and which reduce to traditional necessary conditions for noncontextuality if the non-disturbance condition is satisfied.

DOI
10.1063/1.5024885

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In this paper, we explore the graph approach to contextuality to restate the extended definition of noncontextuality as given by Kujala et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 115, 150401 (2015)] using graph-theoretical terms. This extended definition avoids the assumption of the pre-sheaf or non-disturbance condition, which states that if two contexts overlap, then the marginal distribution obtained for the intersection must be the same, a restriction that will never be perfectly satisfied in real experiments. With this, we are able to derive necessary conditions for extended noncontextuality for any set of random variables based on the geometrical aspects of the graph approach, which can be tested directly with experimental data in any contextuality experiment and which reduce to traditional necessary conditions for noncontextuality if the non-disturbance condition is satisfied.
In an ideal contextuality scenario it is assumed that, whenever two contexts overlap, the marginal distribution obtained for the intersection of these contexts must be the same. Although this nondisturbance idealization has been extremely useful in investigating the limitations of physical theories, in this paper, we will work out a more robust and possibly more experimentally friendly framework for contextuality. Simply put, we will restate the extended definition of noncontextuality provided by the noncontextuality by default and show that in this extended perspective it is possible to avoid weakening the nondisturbance hypothesis. By doing so, we also show how standard tools for characterizing and quantifying contextuality can also be applied to this extended scenario. In particular, we came up with a linear program to check whether or not a behavior is contextual in the extended sense. The connection with the usual definition of contextuality is also established because whenever nondisturbance is fully satisfied the extended conditions reduce to the original ones.
The notion of (non)contextuality pertains to sets of properties measured one subset (context) at a time. We extend this notion to include so-called inconsistently connected systems, in which the measurements of a given property in different contexts may have different distributions, due to contextual biases in experimental design or physical interactions (signaling): a system of measurements has a maximally noncontextual description if they can be imposed a joint distribution on in which the measurements of any one property in different contexts are equal to each other with the maximal probability allowed by their different distributions. We derive necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of such a description in a broad class of systems including Klyachko-Can-Binicioğlu-Shumvosky-type (KCBS), EPR-Bell-type, and Leggett-Garg-type systems. Because these conditions allow for inconsistent connectedness, they are applicable to real experiments. We illustrate this by analyzing an experiment by Lapkiewicz and colleagues aimed at testing contextuality in a KCBS-type system.
Contextuality is usually defined as absence of a joint distribution for a set of measurements (random variables) with known joint distributions of some of its subsets. However, if these subsets of measurements are not disjoint, contextuality is mathematically impossible even if one generally allows (as one must) for random variables not to be jointly distributed. To avoid contradictions one has to adopt the Contextuality‐by‐Default approach: measurements made in different contexts are always distinct and stochastically unrelated to each other. Contextuality is reformulated then in terms of the (im)possibility of imposing on all the measurements in a system a joint distribution of a particular kind: such that any measurements of one and the same property made in different contexts satisfy a specified property, . In the traditional analysis of contextuality means “are equal to each other with probability 1”. However, if the system of measurements violates the “no‐disturbance principle”, due to signaling or experimental biases, then the meaning of has to be generalized, and the proposed generalization is “are equal to each other with maximal possible probability” (applied to any set of measurements of one and the same property). This approach is illustrated on arbitrary systems of binary measurements, including most of quantum systems of traditional interest in contextuality studies (irrespective of whether the “no‐disturbance” principle holds in them).
Dzhafarovet al.(Dzhafarovet al.2016Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A374, 20150099. (doi:10.1098/rsta.2015.0099)) reviewed several behavioural datasets imitating the formal design of the quantum-mechanical contextuality experiments. The conclusion was that none of these datasets exhibited contextuality if understood in the generalized sense proposed by Dzhafarovet al.(2015Found. Phys.7, 762-782. (doi:10.1007/s10701-015-9882-9)), while the traditional definition of contextuality does not apply to these data because they violate the condition of consistent connectedness (also known as marginal selectivity, no-signalling condition, no-disturbance principle, etc.). In this paper, we clarify the relationship between (in)consistent connectedness and (non)contextuality, as well as between the traditional and extended definitions of (non)contextuality, using as an example the Clauser-Horn-Shimony-Holt inequalities originally designed for detecting contextuality in entangled particles.
We address the challenge of extending the criterion for Kochen-Specker contextuality to data with disturbance, to accommodate experimental imperfections or applications to macroscopic settings beyond quantum physics. We find that any such extension must abandon one or more principles that are core to the concept of contextuality. Specifically, we prove that no extended criterion agreeing with Kochen-Specker contextuality in the absence of disturbance can simultaneously satisfy the following: (1) any deterministic system is noncontextual; (2) discarding information cannot turn a noncontextual system into a contextual one; (3) classical post-processing cannot create contextuality; and (4) the joint realization of two statistically independent noncontextual systems is noncontextual. From the standpoint of resource theories, the obstruction arises because free operations can turn noncontextual disturbing behaviors into contextual non-disturbing ones. We suggest that future work on extended contextuality needs to move beyond the standard model-independent framework and account for the causal structure responsible for disturbance.
Contextuality was originally defined only for consistently connected systems of random variables (those without disturbance/signaling). Contextuality-by-Default theory (CbD) offers an extension of the notion of contextuality to inconsistently connected systems (those with disturbance) by defining it in terms of the systems' couplings subject to certain constraints. Such extensions are sometimes met with skepticism. We pose the question of whether it is possible to develop a set of substantive requirements (i.e., those addressing a notion itself rather than its presentation form) such that (1) for any consistently connected system, these requirements are satisfied, but (2) they are violated for some inconsistently connected systems. We show that no such set of requirements is possible, not only for CbD but for all possible CbD-like extensions of contextuality. This follows from the fact that any extended contextuality theory T is contextually equivalent to a theory T' in which all systems are consistently connected. The contextual equivalence means the following: there is a bijective correspondence between the systems in T and T' such that the corresponding systems in T and T' are, in a well-defined sense, mere reformulations of each other, and they are contextual or noncontextual together.