American Journal of Physics
Super classical quantum mechanics: The best interpretation of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics
Willis E. Lamb
Abstract
It has been shown that Newtonian classical mechanics (NCM) suffers from several kinds of chaotic indeterminacies. That means, a large set of problems treated with NCM gives results which are in wild disagreement with observation. In the present paper, these shortcomings are repaired in a simple, obvious, and essentially unique manner. The NCM theory is thereby transformed into a new theory which is fully equivalent to the Heisenberg, Schrödinger, and Dirac nonrelativistic quantum mechanics, with the vital addition of Born’s probabilistic interpretation of the wave function built in from the start. I call this new theory “super classical quantum mechanics” (SCQM). Using Ehrenfest’s theorem of 1927, the classical limit of the new theory, SCQM, is seen to give exactly the results expected of the repaired Newtonian theory of classical mechanics.