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

An Entangled Web of Crime: Bell's Theorem as a Short Story

Jacobs, K, Howard M. Wiseman

Published Apr 26, 2005• 8 citations
OpenAlex

Abstract

Non-locality of the type first elucidated by Bell in 1964 is a difficult concept to explain to non-specialists and undergraduates. Here we attempt this by showing how such non-locality can be used to solve a problem in which someone might find themselves as the result of a collection of normal, even if somewhat unlikely, events. Our story is told in the style of a Sherlock Holmes mystery, and is based on Mermin's formulation of the "paradoxical" illustration of quantum non-locality discovered by Greenberger, Horne and Zeilinger.

Related papers

An entangled web of crime: Bell’s theorem as a short story

Kurt Jacobs, Howard M. Wiseman

Nonlocality of the type first elucidated by Bell in 1964 is a difficult concept to explain to nonspecialists and undergraduates. We attempt to do so by showing how nonlocality can be used to solve a problem in which someone might find themselves as the result of a series of normal, even if somewhat unlikely, events. Our story is told in the style of a Sherlock Holmes mystery, and is based on Mermin’s formulation of the “paradoxical” illustration of quantum nonlocality discovered by Greenberger, Horne, and Zeilinger.

arXiv:quant-ph/0504192•American Journal of Physics•Sep 16, 2005•7 citations

Comment on “An entangled web of crime: Bell’s theorem as a short story,” by K. Jacobs and H. M. Wiseman [Am. J. Phys. 73 (10), 932–937 (2005)]

P. K. Aravind

American Journal of Physics•Jul 13, 2007•0 citations

Locality and the Hardy theorem

Arthur I. Fine

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.

Cambridge University Press eBooks•Dec 28, 1999•3 citations

Bell's Theorem without Inequalities: On the Inception and Scope of the GHZ Theorem

Olival Freire, Osvaldo Frota Pessoa Junior

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.

Cambridge University Press eBooks•Aug 31, 2016•1 citation

Variation on a theme by GHZM

P. K. Aravind

In the Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger-Mermin (GHZM) proof of Bell's theorem, a source periodically emits an entangled state of three particles whose properties are analyzed by three distant observers and used to prove Bell's nonlocality theorem. This paper analyzes a somewhat different gedanken experiment involving only two observers that nevertheless makes indirect use of the GHZ states to prove Bell's theorem. The relationship of the GHZM proof to the present one is discussed, and it is pointed out that the latter provides an interesting new view of the connection between the "two theorems of John Bell".

arXiv:quant-ph/0701031•Jan 7, 2007•0 citations

Bell's theorem and beyond

Mark S. Hillery, Bernard Yurke

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.

Quantum and Semiclassical Optics Journal of the European Optical Society Part B•Jun 1, 1995•19 citations
Non-locality of the type first elucidated by Bell in 1964 is a difficult concept to explain to non-specialists and undergraduates. Here we attempt this by showing how such non-locality can be used to solve a problem in which someone might find themselves as the result of a collection of normal, even if somewhat unlikely, events. Our story is told in the style of a Sherlock Holmes mystery, and is based on Mermin's formulation of the "paradoxical" illustration of quantum non-locality discovered by Greenberger, Horne and Zeilinger.
Nonlocality of the type first elucidated by Bell in 1964 is a difficult concept to explain to nonspecialists and undergraduates. We attempt to do so by showing how nonlocality can be used to solve a problem in which someone might find themselves as the result of a series of normal, even if somewhat unlikely, events. Our story is told in the style of a Sherlock Holmes mystery, and is based on Mermin’s formulation of the “paradoxical” illustration of quantum nonlocality discovered by Greenberger, Horne, and Zeilinger.
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.
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 the Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger-Mermin (GHZM) proof of Bell's theorem, a source periodically emits an entangled state of three particles whose properties are analyzed by three distant observers and used to prove Bell's nonlocality theorem. This paper analyzes a somewhat different gedanken experiment involving only two observers that nevertheless makes indirect use of the GHZ states to prove Bell's theorem. The relationship of the GHZM proof to the present one is discussed, and it is pointed out that the latter provides an interesting new view of the connection between the "two theorems of John Bell".
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.