The quantum of action was found more then a century ago, but until now the meaning of quantum theory is often claimed to be “unclear” or even “not truly understandable.” Another prejudice is that quantum theory is only relevant for the range of atomic and sub-atomic phenomena. After a century of successful applications without any evidence at odds with the predictions of quantum theory, and in view of the fact that at present quantum theory is at the economic bottom of about one third of the Gross National Product, the need for a comprehensive and even popular understanding of the principles of quantum theory, preferably dispensing with the burden of the full mathematical apparatus, is more urgent than ever. Interestingly, there is a connection between quantum theory and your daily-life experience, suggesting to extend and generalize the Copenhagen interpretation in such a way that the observer and his consciousness is no longer excluded from scientific description. Moreover, Quantum theory is easier to understood, if one realizes that its range of applicability surpasses widely that of quantum mechanics, comparable to the way classical physics surpasses classical mechanics. The essential new aspect is the role of abstract quantum information, referred to as Protyposis. The idea that quantum information can have an ontological status equivalent to matter or energy was developed more than half a century ago, but it is only rather recently that, in view of the success of experimental work, the relevance of quantum information has been widely acknowledged. The concept of abstract quantum information is especially helpful in the understanding of the measuring process.
The quantum of action was found more then a century ago, but until now the meaning of quantum theory is often claimed to be “unclear” or even “not truly understandable.” Another prejudice is that quantum theory is only relevant for the range of atomic and sub-atomic phenomena. After a century of successful applications without any evidence at odds with the predictions of quantum theory, and in view of the fact that at present quantum theory is at the economic bottom of about one third of the Gross National Product, the need for a comprehensive and even popular understanding of the principles of quantum theory, preferably dispensing with the burden of the full mathematical apparatus, is more urgent than ever. Interestingly, there is a connection between quantum theory and your daily-life experience, suggesting to extend and generalize the Copenhagen interpretation in such a way that the observer and his consciousness is no longer excluded from scientific description. Moreover, Quantum theory is easier to understood, if one realizes that its range of applicability surpasses widely that of quantum mechanics, comparable to the way classical physics surpasses classical mechanics. The essential new aspect is the role of abstract quantum information, referred to as Protyposis. The idea that quantum information can have an ontological status equivalent to matter or energy was developed more than half a century ago, but it is only rather recently that, in view of the success of experimental work, the relevance of quantum information has been widely acknowledged. The concept of abstract quantum information is especially helpful in the understanding of the measuring process.
Quantum theory is the most successful physical theory. About one third of the gross national product in the developed countries results from its applications. But very often quantum theory is still declared as "crazy" or "not understandable". However, quantum theory has a clear mathematical structure that expresses well-known experiences from every day life: A whole is often more than the sum of its parts, and not only the facts also the possibilities can act. If such structures become important then the consequences differ from the models of classical physics which rests on the fundamental differences between matter and motion, material and force, localization and extension, fullness and emptiness. From quantum theory one can learn that all these differences are useful in many cases but are not fundamental. There are equivalences between them, and these can be extended even to the equivalence between matter, energy and abstract quantum information. It is cosmological funded and is denominated as "Protyposis" to avoid the connotation of information and meaning. Protyposis enables a fundamentally new understanding of matter which can be seen as "formed", "condensed" or "designed" abstract quantum information. One result of the Protyposis is a derivation of Einstein's equations from the abstract quantum information. Another consequence is the ontological reality of the mind and its connection to a brain which can be explained without any dualistic model.
Quantum theory is the most successful physical theory ever.About one third of the gross national product in the developed countries results from its applications.These applications range from nuclear power to most of the high-tech tools for computing, laser, solar cells and so on.No limit for its range of validity has been found up to now.Quantum theory has a clear mathematical structure, so a physics student can learn it in a short time.However, very often quantum theory is considered as being "crazy" or "not understandable".Such a stance appears reasonable as long as quantum theory is seen primarily as a theory of small particles and the forces between them.However, if quantum theory is understood more deeply, namely as a general theory of structures, not only the range is widely expanded, but it also becomes more comprehensible (T.Görnitz, 1999).Quantum structures can be material, like atoms, electrons and so on.They can also be energetic, like photons, and finally they can be mere structures, such as quantum bits.Keeping this in mind it becomes apprehensible that quantum theory has two not easily reconcilable aspects: on the one hand, it possesses a clear mathematical structure, on the other hand, it accounts for well-known experiences of everyday life: e.g. a whole is often more than the sum of its parts, and not only the facts but also the possibilities can be effective.If henadic and future structures (i.e.structures which are related to unity [Greek "hen"] and to future) become important in scientific analysis, then the viewable facts in real life differ from the calculated results of models of classical physics, which suppose elementary distinctions between matter and motion, material and force, localization and extension, fullness and emptiness and which describe any process as a succession of facts.From quantum theory one can learn two elementary insights:1.Not only facts but also possibilities can influence the way in which material objects behave.2. The elementary distinctions made in classical models are often useful, but not fundamental.Quantum theory shows that there are equivalences between the concepts of matter and motion, material and force, localization and extension, fullness and emptiness, and so on, www.intechopen.com How to referenceIn order to correctly reference this scholarly work, feel free to
Applications of quantum mechanics have led to many successful predictions and explanations of puzzling phenomena, and we now apply quantum mechanics to gain, process, and communicate information in novel ways. We can understand quantum mechanics by understanding how we have applied it. We should not seek agreement on the nature of the world it represents, because this theory does not itself represent the physical world (though its applications do help us to represent it better). When applied to a quantum state, quantum mechanics yields probabiities for physical events: both state and probability are objective--not because they represent elements of phyiscal reality, but because each exerts norrmative authority over the beliefs of anyone who accepts quantum mechanics and applies it relative to a physical situation they may (but need not) occupy. These events may be described by statements that are meaningful in an appropriate environmental context, and quantum mechanics can help one to say when that is. Measurement creates an appropriate context, so here the Born rule indirectly yields probabilities of measurement outcomes. The quantum state of a system does not "collapse" on measurement: a new state must be assigned relative to a physical situation in which information about the outcome is accessible. Understood this way, there is no measurement problem, and violations of Bell inequalities does not demonstrate "spooky" non-local action. Quantum field theories have no physical ontology of their own: a quantum field is a mathematical object in a model whose application helps us to improve and extend our descriptions of the world in other terms. We cannot realise the scenario of Wigner's friend and its recent extensions: but the data that provide overwhelming evidence for quantum mechanics are objective in the same sense as the relative measurement outcomes described in those scenarios.
Applications of quantum mechanics have led to many successful predictions and explanations of puzzling phenomena, and we now apply quantum mechanics to gain, process, and communicate information in novel ways. We can understand quantum mechanics by understanding how we have applied it. We should not seek agreement on the nature of the world it represents, because this theory does not itself represent the physical world (though its applications do help us to represent it better). When applied to a quantum state, quantum mechanics yields probabilities for physical events: both state and probability are objective—not because they represent elements of physical reality, but because each exerts normative authority over the beliefs of anyone who accepts quantum mechanics and applies it relative to a physical situation they may (but need not) occupy. These events may be described by statements (about values of magnitudes) that are meaningful in an appropriate environmental context, and quantum mechanics can help one to say when that is. Measurement creates an appropriate context, so here the Born rule indirectly yields probabilities of measurement outcomes. The quantum state of a system does not “collapse” on measurement: a new state must be assigned relative to a physical situation in which information about the outcome is accessible. Understood this way, there is no measurement problem, and violation of Bell inequalities does not demonstrate “spooky” non-local action. Quantum field theories have no physical ontology of their own: a quantum field is a mathematical object in a model whose application helps to improve and extend our descriptions of the world in other terms. We cannot realise the scenario of Wigner’s friend and its recent extensions: but the data that provide overwhelming evidence for quantum mechanics are objective in the same sense as the relative measurement outcomes described in those scenarios.
Quantum theory is a phenomenally successful cornerstone of physics. But a recent poll among quantum physicists shows that there is still little agreement on what the theory tells us about physical reality. Yet precious bits of consensus are emerging. As always, Albert Einstein was ahead of his time. Quantum theory was still in its infancy, its formalism a mere sketch, and its implications only beginning to be realized. Yet Einstein, in 1917, already spotted what would trouble him throughout his lifetime. He concluded that the nascent theory, which he had helped initiate, seemed to leave “time and direction of elementary processes,” such as the spontaneous emission of radiation from a molecule, “to chance” 1. Einstein's conclusion was visionary. It was also incredibly bold, for it suggested a radical departure from the powerful, centuries-old deterministic and causal worldview of classical physics. But Einstein also immediately expressed his discomfort with the idea of fundamental chance. In fact, his worries were just the seed of what would turn into one of the longest and most heated debates in the history of physics. What does quantum theory mean, and what does it tell us about the nature of reality? Some of the brightest minds in physics locked horns over these issues. Besides Einstein, there were Niels Bohr, Erwin Schrödinger, Werner Heisenberg, Pascual Jordan, Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker, Wolfgang Pauli, and Richard Feynman, just to name a few. Ask anyone today working on foundational questions in quantum theory and you are likely to hear that there is still no consensus on many of these questions—all the while, of course, everybody seems to be in perfect agreement on how to apply the quantum formalism when it comes to making experimental predictions. Remarkably, there has never been any serious attempt to find out what the current opinions of the community really are and how they may be correlated. We jumped on the opportunity and polled 33 participants at a 2011 conference on “Quantum Physics and the Nature of Reality” (Fig. 1) 2. (We hasten to add that our poll is to be understood as merely a snapshot and certainly cannot claim to be representative.) As soon as we had collected the questionnaires, the respondents eagerly asked to hear the results. Evidently, we had not been the only curious party. What did we find? The fundamental questions, it seems, still elicit radically different responses. Take the quantum state—represented by the wavefunction—as an illustration. The wavefunction is the central mathematical symbol of quantum mechanics. It allows us to make incredibly accurate predictions, be it in atomic, molecular, or solid-state physics. But how are we to interpret it? Is it itself a physical property, or does it merely represent our knowledge? Our poll revealed a tie between these two positions. And not only that: a third of respondents preferred a mix of both viewpoints—perhaps a sign that a more nuanced view, or even a synthesis of views, may be on the horizon. Only 3% of those polled thought that quantum states never refer to a single system but only to ensembles of systems. Perhaps this departure from the ensemble view—a view that, we suspect, remains more popular in the physics community at large—has to do with the fact that experiments with single quantum systems have become routine in today's quantum-information laboratories. Sharp disagreement was in evidence on another deep question. Abraham Pais, Einstein's biographer, recalled that “during one walk Einstein suddenly stopped, turned to me and asked whether I really believed that the moon exists only when I look at it” 3. Putting the issue differently, are the physical properties of objects well defined before we actually measure them? Half of the respondents in our poll believed that they sometimes were, while the other half said that they never were. These two positions correspond to radically different ways of understanding the function of measurement: either as simply ascertaining—at least sometimes—of what is already there, or as an act of genuine creation. The role of measurement is also at the heart of another perennial favorite of foundational discussions, the measurement problem. The measurement problem highlights a curious fact about quantum theory: while the act of measurement assumes a fundamental role, it is not described—not without interpretive contortions, anyway—by the dynamical law of quantum theory, the Schrödinger equation. For decades, the measurement problem was seen by many as the main stumbling block for quantum theory, sparking a storm of rivaling attempts to deal with this perceived issue. Today, the waters seem to have calmed and attention shifted elsewhere, as only less than a fourth of respondents consider the measurement problem “a severe difficulty threatening quantum mechanics.” Changing attitudes are also evident when it comes to the issue of chance Einstein had brought to light in 1917. Today, the question of the randomness of quantum events no longer seems to be all that contentious. Most of our respondents accepted randomness as irreducible or a fundamental concept in nature (or both). Less than one-tenth of respondents thought that quantum randomness was merely apparent rather than fundamental, and no one believed in a hidden determinism governing quantum events. We wish we could hear Einstein's opinion today. Why have attitudes and priorities changed? It's hard to say, but we think there may be several driving forces. The rapid ascent of quantum information science has not only led to applications such as secure cryptography and the promise of lightning-fast quantum computers, but has also shed new light on foundational problems and handed us new tools for addressing them. Our poll shows that these tools are considered a welcome addition, with three-fourths seeing quantum information as a breath of fresh air for foundational investigations. There is also optimism about the future technological development of quantum information, with more than 75% of respondents expecting a working and useful quantum computer to be realized within the next fifty years. Such optimism might be rooted in the astonishing experimental progress we have witnessed over the past decades, another driving force behind changing attitudes. We are now at stage where almost perfect experimental control of single quantum systems has been achieved. The 2012 Nobel Prize in physics was awarded for just such experiments. This has put at our fingertips the ability to actually carry out the thought experiments—or approximations thereof, at any rate—that the founders of quantum theory had dreamed up. Take Schrödinger's cat. In 1935, Schrödinger wanted to illustrate what seemed to him an absurd prediction of the new theory: that the strange quantum superpositions of the atomic world can be amplified to everyday objects. Schrödinger's object of choice was a cat in a specifically prepared box. Quantum theory then suggested that the state of the cat should become transformed into a bizarre quantum superposition of being simultaneously alive and dead. But what Schrödinger had intended as a “burlesque” 4 thought experiment is now approaching experimental reality. Over the last decades, researchers have become increasingly skilled in breeding small versions of Schrödinger's cat. While they don't involve actual cats, they do already involve large biological molecules. Our respondents, it seems, were inspired by such developments. A solid two-thirds majority declared that they don't expect any fundamental limit in this enterprise of observing larger and larger objects in superpositions of macroscopically distinct states. No limit, then, for quantum theory—something that Bohr had already suggested when he, in some of his early thought experiments, considered apparatuses that included macroscopic parts behaving in quantum-mechanical ways. There are other new trends. Why do people seem to be much more at ease with relativity theory than with quantum theory? For one, both special and general relativity theory are grounded in a few simple physical principles. By contrast, quantum theory is lacking such a foundation and is instead based on a rather abstract mathematical body. Today, several researchers are out to change this situation, trying to derive quantum theory from a small set of physical or information-theoretic principles. They hope that in this way, we will understand why we have this peculiar theory to begin with. A majority in our poll regarded such “reconstructions” of quantum theory as giving useful insights, indicating once more that any new tool that promises fresh insights is embraced with an open mind. To be sure, many (albeit not all) of the questions we asked in the poll are interpretive questions. This means that unless we should find out some day that quantum theory is in fact not always valid—in which case we would have to rethink the whole game—experiments arguably can't play the role of the arbiter. Some physicists will conclude from this that we need not bother with such questions, and relegate them to philosophy. We think this is too quick. Many ideas in physics didn't come out of thin air, but came about when someone started looking at a problem with a certain philosophical disposition. In this sense, we may think of the plurality of views in quantum mechanics as productive. Every interpretation highlights some aspect of quantum theory, is particularly suited for explaining particular phenomena, and may inspire new technologies—such as the quantum computer—or even new physics. What, then, does the future hold? Half of the respondents in our poll believe that in fifty years from now, we will probably still be coming together for conferences on the fundamental questions of quantum theory. But what kinds of questions will be on the agenda? Will we still be worrying about the same problems as today? Or will these problems have been solved—or found to be less relevant—and our focus shifted to new questions once again? Who knows. But the location of the conference where we conducted the poll may tell a story. It was the place of a monastery, and a central position in the battle between Catholics and Protestants during the seventeenth century. Many of the questions that were hotly debated back then are no longer of interest to many people today, and other, new questions have since taken center stage in our society. Maybe some of the battles over the interpretation of quantum theory will meet a similar fate.
For many years the physical interpretation of quantum theory has been dominated by the “wave-particle duality” attitude of the “Copenhagen school.” This point of view is eloquently described in Bohr's collection of essays on the subject. Despite persistent concerns with apparent paradoxes and limitations to this interpretation (as exemplified by Schrodinger's cat, the paradox of Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen, among others), the Copenhagen view persists de facto in the daily life of the modern physicist. Traditional quantum theory has so successfully explained such a vast amount of data in atomic and molecular physics, solid state physics (and to a lesser extent, elementary particle physics) that little doubt can exist concerning its essential validity. As a consequence of the overwhelming practical success of the “Copenhagen interpretation, ” the latter has acquired the status of dogma. For many years, therefore, most physicists have found it expedient to relegate the puzzling aspects of the theory to philosophers, and mathematicians. Nevertheless, a persistent interest in this subject has produced a significant and fascinating literature, reviewed by Jammer. In recent years, concerns over the proper meaning to be ascribed to quantum theory have produced an increasingly deep and incisive series of investigations. These investigations fall generally into two categories: either (1) discussion of the philosophical content of the theory, or (2) analyses of the mathematical variants of the theory and their connection with differing interpretational schemes. Physicists tend to be detached from a commitment to philosophical issues, because of their realization of the transient character of the meanings attached to theories of the day. As a simple illustration of this we can mention the profound differences between nonrelativistic and relativistic quantum mechanics.