Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

Physics Today

Quantum all the way

Published May 5, 2008• 12 citations
Publisher

Abstract

How does our classical world emerge from the counterintuitive principles of quantum theory? Can we even be sure that the world doesn't 'go quantum' when no one is watching? Philip Ball talks to the theorists and experimentalists trying to find out.
DOI
10.1063/pt.5.022204

Related papers

On quantum theory

Rudolf Haag

A discussion of fundamental aspects of quantum theory is presented, stressing the essential role of “events.”

International Journal of Quantum Information•Jun 1, 2019•4 citations

Beyond Weird: Why Everything You Thought You Knew about Quantum Physics Is Different

Philip Ball

“Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.” Since Niels Bohr said this many years ago, quantum mechanics has only been getting more shocking. We now realize that it’s not really telling us that “weird” things happen out of sight, on the tiniest level, in the atomic world. Rather, we can now see that everything is quantum: our everyday world is simply what quantum becomes at the human scale. But if quantum mechanics is right, what seems obvious and right in our everyday world is built on foundations that don’t seems obvious or right—or even possible. An exhilarating tour of the contemporary quantum landscape, Beyond Weird is a book about what quantum physics really means—and what it doesn’t. Science writer Philip Ball offers an up-to-date, accessible account of the quest to come to grips with the most fundamental theory of physical reality, and to explain how its counterintuitive principles underpin the world we experience. Over the past decade it has become clear that quantum physics is less a theory about particles and waves, uncertainty and fuzziness, than a theory about information and knowledge—about what can be known, and how we know it. Discoveries and experiments over the past few decades have called into question the meanings and limits of space and time, cause and effect, and, ultimately, of knowledge itself. The quantum world Ball shows us isn’t a different world. It is our world, and if anything deserves to be called “weird,” it’s us.

•Oct 18, 2018•12 citations

What Does Quantum Theory Actually Tell Us about Reality?

Anil Ananthaswamy

Scientific American•Dec 1, 2018•3 citations

Questioning quantum speed

Philip Ball

The promised speed of a quantum computer is usually explained in terms of its ability to make many calculations in parallel. But, as Philip Ball reports, many quantum theorists reject this idea and point to other explanations entirely.

Physics World•Jan 1, 2014•4 citations

Decoherence and the Appearance of a Classical World in Quantum Theory

Erich Joos, H. Dieter Zeh, Claus Kiefer +3 more

Springer eBooks•Jan 1, 2003•2,118 citations

Two slits and one hell of a quantum conundrum

Philip Ball

Philip Ball lauds a study of a famous experiment and the insights it offers into a thoroughly maddening theory. Philip Ball lauds a study of a famous experiment and the insights it offers into a thoroughly maddening theory.

Nature•Aug 3, 2018•4 citations
“Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.” Since Niels Bohr said this many years ago, quantum mechanics has only been getting more shocking. We now realize that it’s not really telling us that “weird” things happen out of sight, on the tiniest level, in the atomic world. Rather, we can now see that everything is quantum: our everyday world is simply what quantum becomes at the human scale. But if quantum mechanics is right, what seems obvious and right in our everyday world is built on foundations that don’t seems obvious or right—or even possible. An exhilarating tour of the contemporary quantum landscape, Beyond Weird is a book about what quantum physics really means—and what it doesn’t. Science writer Philip Ball offers an up-to-date, accessible account of the quest to come to grips with the most fundamental theory of physical reality, and to explain how its counterintuitive principles underpin the world we experience. Over the past decade it has become clear that quantum physics is less a theory about particles and waves, uncertainty and fuzziness, than a theory about information and knowledge—about what can be known, and how we know it. Discoveries and experiments over the past few decades have called into question the meanings and limits of space and time, cause and effect, and, ultimately, of knowledge itself. The quantum world Ball shows us isn’t a different world. It is our world, and if anything deserves to be called “weird,” it’s us.