The authors survey what is known about correlations in physical systems. Bell (1964-6) found that locally realistic theories are limited in the types of correlations which they allow. The more recent results of Greenberger, Horne and Zeilinger (1992) and of Hardy (1989) have shown that local realism imposes even stronger restrictions than those found by Bell. It is less well known that quantum mechanics is also limited in the kinds of correlations it can produce. This was first discovered by Tsirelson (1980). The authors discuss Tsirelson's results and related work by Landau (1987). They conclude by presenting further conditions which quantum mechanical correlations must satisfy.
The authors survey what is known about correlations in physical systems. Bell (1964-6) found that locally realistic theories are limited in the types of correlations which they allow. The more recent results of Greenberger, Horne and Zeilinger (1992) and of Hardy (1989) have shown that local realism imposes even stronger restrictions than those found by Bell. It is less well known that quantum mechanics is also limited in the kinds of correlations it can produce. This was first discovered by Tsirelson (1980). The authors discuss Tsirelson's results and related work by Landau (1987). They conclude by presenting further conditions which quantum mechanical correlations must satisfy.
The Bell theorem can take the form of several inequalities, as we have seen in §4.2. Moreover, since it was discovered, the theorem has stimulated the discovery of several other mathematical contradictions between the predictions of quantum mechanics and those of local realism. We review a few of them in this chapter: GHZ contradictions (§5.1) and their generalization (§5.2), Cabello's inequality (§5.3), and Hardy's impossibilities (§5.4). Finally, in §5.5, we discuss the notion of contextuality and introduce the BKS theorem. GHZ contradiction For many years, everyone thought that Bell had basically exhausted the subject by considering all really interesting situations, and that two-spin systems provided the most spectacular quantum violations of local realism. It therefore came as a surprise to many when in 1989 Greenberger, Horne, and Zeilinger (GHZ) showed that systems containing more than two correlated particles may actually exhibit even more dramatic violations of local realism [188, 189]. They involve a sign contradiction (100% violation) for perfect correlations, while the BCHSH inequalities are violated by about 40% (Cirelson bound) and deal with situations where the results of measurements are not completely correlated. In this section, we discuss three-particle systems, but generalizations to N particles are possible (§5.2). Derivation GHZ contradictions may occur in various systems, not necessarily involving spins. Initially, they were introduced in the context of entanglement swapping (§6.3.2) for four particles [188] or entanglement of three spinless particles [189].
Introduction Since its inception, fifty years ago, Bell's theorem has had a long history not only of experimental tests but also of theoretical developments. Studying pairs of correlated quantummechanical particles separated in space, in a composite “entangled” state, Bell [1] showed that the joint ascription of hidden variables and locality to the system led to an inequality that is violated by the predictions of quantum mechanics. Fifteen years later, experiments confirmed the predictions of quantum mechanics, ruling out a large class of local realist theories. One of the most meaningful theoretical developments that followed Bell's work was the Greenberger–Horne–Zeilinger (GHZ) theorem, also known as Bell's theorem without inequalities. In 1989, the American physicists Daniel Greenberger and Michael Horne, who had been working on Bell's theorem since the late 1960s, together with the Austrian physicist Anton Zeilinger, introduced a novelty into the testing of entanglement, extending Bell's theorem in a different and interesting direction. According to Franck Laloë [2], For many years, everyone thought that Bell had basically exhausted the subject by considering all really interesting situations, and that two-spin systems provided the most spectacular quantum violations of local realism. It therefore came as a surprise to many when in 1989 Greenberger, Horne, and Zeilinger (GHZ) showed that systems containing more than two correlated particles may actually exhibit even more dramatic violations of local realism. The trio analyzed the Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen 1935 argument once again and were able to write what are now called Greenberger–Horne–Zeilinger (GHZ) entangled states, involving three or four correlated spin-1/2 particles, leading to conflicts between local realist theories and quantum mechanics. However, unlike Bell's theorem, the conflict now was not of a statistical nature, as was the case with Bell's theorem, insofar as measurements on a single GHZ state could lead to conflicting predictions with local realistic models [3–5]. In this paper we present the history of the creation of this theorem and analyze its scope.
In this work we look for novel classes of Bell's inequalities and methods to produce them. We also find their quantum violations including, if possible, the maximum one. The Jordan bases method that we explain in Chapter 2 is about using a pair of certain type of orthonormal bases whose spans are subspaces related to measurement outcomes of incompatible quantities on the same physical system. Jordan vectors are the briefest way of expressing the relative orientation of any two subspaces. This feature helps us to reduce the dimensionality of the parameter space on which we do searches for optimization. The work is published in [24]. In Chapter 3, we attempt to find a connection between group theory and Bell's theorem. We devise a way of generating terms of a Bell's inequality that are related to elements of an algebraic group. The same group generates both the terms of the Bell's inequality and the observables that are used to calculate the quantum value of the Bell expression. Our results are published in [25][26]. In brief, Bell's theorem is the main tool of a research program that was started by Einstein, Podolsky, Rosen [19] and Bohr [8] in the early days of quantum mechanics in their discussions about the core nature of physical systems. These debates were about a novel type of physical states called superposition states, which are introduced by quantum mechanics and manifested in the apparent inevitable randomness in measurement outcomes of identically prepared systems. Bell's huge contribution was to find a means of quantifying the problem and hence of opening the way to experimental verification by rephrasing the questions as limits on certain combinations of correlations between measurement results of spatially separate systems [7]. Thanks to Bell, the fundamental questions related to the nature of quantum mechanical systems became quantifiable [6]. According to Bell's theorem, some correlations between quantum entangled systems that involve incompatible quantities are not allowed by classical mechanics, a feature that is called as "quantum nonlocality". An experimental observation of those correlations, in other words, a violation of the limits imposed by classical physics, implies the correctness of quantum description and invalidates the classical, local realistic models. The first Bell experiments were proposed by Clauser, Horne, Shimony, and Holt, who invented the most famous Bell's inequality [13]. Later, the Aspect experiments were satisfactory enough for the physics community to be conclusive about the validation of quantum mechanics [1][3][4][2]. Ekert's work on applications of quantum nonlocality to communication resulted in the new field of quantum communication and cryptography, and turned the research program into a practical one [20]. Pitowsky showed a method to find all expressions of limitations due to local realism, all Bell's inequalities, for a given physical scenario. He also proved that the problem is, unfortunately, NP-complete and hence as the scenarios get more complex, they also become computationally intractable [33][34]. Therefore, different methods for the solution of special cases of the problem are necessary. Inequalities found for those special cases can be called classes of Bell's inequalities. For example, Werner and Wolf [41] and Collins, Gisin, Linden, Massar, and Popescu [16] found classes that cover a wide range of scenarios. Our work is a similar kind of effort to produce and study new types of Bell's inequalities.
We show, using a Bell inequality argument, that quantum correlations cannot be regarded as local elements of reality. It is well known since the work of J.S. Bell, that one cannot have locally preexistent values for all physical quantities, whether they are deterministic or stochastic. The Bell inequality argument we present here shows this is also impossible for correlations among subsystems of an individual isolated composite system. Thus there is no philosophical difference with respect to questions of locality and realism between correlations on the one hand and values of quantities on the other hand that could allow one to have a different view about their ontological status. Neither of them can be used to build up a world consisting of some local realistic structure. This argument has an important advantage over others who use so-called Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger and Hardy type arguments because it does not need perfect correlations but only statistical correlations. It can therefore easily be tested in currently feasible experiments using four particle entanglement.
But this conclusion [nonlocality] needs careful discussion in order to clarify what is going on . (Redhead 1987, p. 3) Within the foundations of physics in recent years, Bell's theorem has played the role of what Thomas Kuhn calls a ‘paradigm’: that is, an exemplary piece of work that others learn from, imitate and develop. Following a period of articulation and consolidation, the first generation of developments of the Bell theorem was initiated by Heywood and Redhead (1983). They produced a nonlocality result in the algebraic style of the Bell–Kochen–Specker theorem (Bell 1966; Kochen and Specker 1967), moving away from the probabilistic relations characteristic of the Bell theorems proper. More recently a second generation develops results by Peres (1990), Greenberger–Horne–Zeilinger (1990), and Hardy (1993). In addition to moving away from probabilities, this generation tries to dispense with the limiting inequalities of the Bell theorem to yield socalled ‘Bell theorems without inequalities’. With respect to probabilities, however, Hardy is a half-way house. It requires no inequalities but the result contradicts quantum mechanics under certain locality assumptions only if the statistical predictions of quantum mechanics hold in at least one case. I want to examine the Hardy theorem and its interpretation. Initially, I intend to ignore respects in which it dispenses with probabilities because I want to point out the interesting significance of the theorem in a probabilistic context. We will see that when probabilities are restored, so are inequalities. Then we will see what the theorem has to contribute on the topic of locality.
The concept of local realism entails certain restrictions concerning the possible occurrence of correlated events. Although these restrictions are inherent in classical physics they have never been noticed until Bell showed in 1964 that general correlations in quantum mechanics can not be interpreted in a classical way. We demonstrate how a local realistic way of thinking about measurement results necessarily leads to limitations with regard to the possible appearance of correlated events. These limitations, which are equivalent to Bell's inequality can be easily formulated as an immediate consequence of our discussion.