This work proposes an operational framework, denoted OFID-G, to investigate whether quantum coherence remains fully reconstructible from locally accessible information, even when global unitary evolution is preserved. The framework is formulated within the Ontological Framework of Imbricated Degrees (OFID), in which physical states may involve degrees of freedom that are not fully accessible within a given local observational regime. Within this perspective, OFID-G defines a possible structural limitation on the local accessibility of coherence, without introducing any modification to quantum dynamics. The central concept is regime-dependent reconstructibility: coherence is said to be reconstructible if a single recovery operation, fixed by calibration alone, can operationally recover it across a tomographically informative family of preparations, and non-reconstructible if a persistent limitation remains despite such procedures. This state-independent formulation anchors the criterion in the theory of approximate recoverability of quantum channels. Rather than predicting a specific mechanism, the framework defines a falsifiable structural criterion distinguishing reconstructible and non-reconstructible regimes, based on controlled variation of physically relevant parameters. The approach remains fully compatible with standard quantum mechanics and does not invoke collapse models or deviations from unitarity. Its empirical content lies in testing whether all observed decoherence effects can be fully accounted for by known environmental mechanisms. This provides a minimal and operational test of the completeness of standard decoherence modeling, shifting the focus from dynamical mechanisms to structural limitations of information accessibility. The framework is developed within the OFID research program (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.18868538); its concrete experimental realization is developed in a companion operational paper (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19351945). Project page :https://alexsasfrance.github.io/OFID-framework/
This work proposes an operational framework, denoted OFID-G, to investigate whether quantum coherence remains fully reconstructible from locally accessible information, even when global unitary evolution is preserved. The framework is formulated within the Ontological Framework of Imbricated Degrees (OFID), in which physical states may involve degrees of freedom that are not fully accessible within a given local observational regime. Within this perspective, OFID-G defines a possible structural limitation on the local accessibility of coherence, without introducing any modification to quantum dynamics. The central concept is regime-dependent reconstructibility: coherence is said to be reconstructible if a single recovery operation, fixed by calibration alone, can operationally recover it across a tomographically informative family of preparations, and non-reconstructible if a persistent limitation remains despite such procedures. This state-independent formulation anchors the criterion in the theory of approximate recoverability of quantum channels. Rather than predicting a specific mechanism, the framework defines a falsifiable structural criterion distinguishing reconstructible and non-reconstructible regimes, based on controlled variation of physically relevant parameters. The approach remains fully compatible with standard quantum mechanics and does not invoke collapse models or deviations from unitarity. Its empirical content lies in testing whether all observed decoherence effects can be fully accounted for by known environmental mechanisms. This provides a minimal and operational test of the completeness of standard decoherence modeling, shifting the focus from dynamical mechanisms to structural limitations of information accessibility. The framework is developed within the OFID research program (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.18868538); its concrete experimental realization is developed in a companion operational paper (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19351945). Project page :https://alexsasfrance.github.io/OFID-framework/
This work proposes the Ontological Framework of Imbricated Degrees (OFID), a minimal ontological structure intended to clarify the relationship between global physical states and locally accessible descriptions within contemporary physics. The framework is derived from structural constraints already present in established physics, including quantum decoherence, entanglement, and gravitational horizons. These phenomena jointly indicate a dissociation between global ontological states and effective local descriptions. OFID introduces no modification to the formalism of quantum mechanics or general relativity and proposes no additional dynamical mechanisms. Instead, it provides a minimal ontological clarification of the informational accessibility structure implicit in these theories. The framework is explicitly exposed to empirical falsification through the OFID-G conjecture, which proposes the possible existence of an irreducible gravitational contribution to decoherence affecting mesoscopic quantum superpositions. This work aims to provide a coherent conceptual structure linking phenomena often treated separately in modern physics, including quantum superposition, measurement, decoherence, entanglement, and gravitational horizons. Project page (experimental framework, OFID-G, and OFID): https://alexsasfrance.github.io/OFID-framework/
This record contains version 2 of the preprint “Identifiability Limits in Experimental Tests of Quantum Collapse.” It supersedes the conceptually broader first version deposited under DOI 10.5281/zenodo.19617199 and substantially revises the framing, formal results and experimental analysis. The paper formulates experimental tests of objective-collapse dynamics as an operational identifiability problem. It shows that finite accessible CPTP process statistics cannot uniformly distinguish fundamental nonunitarity from an unrestricted unitary-environment dilation. It then separates visibility loss, record formation and global measurement access, and derives a nuisance-profiled Fisher-information criterion for determining when complementary measurement channels jointly identify a shared collapse-parameter vector. A four-arm matched-control architecture is proposed that combines baseline stability, coherent reversibility, calibrated decoherence, durable-record formation and at least one independent side-effect channel. The result is a falsifiable experimental decision framework and a boundary on what accessible data can establish; it is not presented as an ontological solution of the quantum measurement problem. A major technical revision is available as version 3 under DOI 10.5281/zenodo.22072199. This record contains version 2 of the preprint “Identifiability Limits in Experimental Tests of Quantum Collapse.” It supersedes the conceptually broader first version deposited under DOI 10.5281/zenodo.19617199 and substantially revises the framing, formal results and experimental analysis. The paper formulates experimental tests of objective-collapse dynamics as an operational identifiability problem. It shows that finite accessible CPTP process statistics cannot uniformly distinguish fundamental nonunitarity from an unrestricted unitary-environment dilation. It then separates visibility loss, record formation and global measurement access, and derives a nuisance-profiled Fisher-information criterion for determining when complementary measurement channels jointly identify a shared collapse-parameter vector. A four-arm matched-control architecture is proposed that combines baseline stability, coherent reversibility, calibrated decoherence, durable-record formation and at least one independent side-effect channel. The result is a falsifiable experimental decision framework and a boundary on what accessible data can establish; it is not presented as an ontological solution of the quantum measurement problem. Files in this record:1. Main preprint PDF.2. Reproducibility package containing the journal-neutral source, editable manuscript, original figures, deterministic calculation and figure-generation code, machine-readable results, citation metadata and SHA-256 checksums. The included calculations are deterministic mathematical and synthetic checks; they are not experimental validation.
In simple terms, this work defines how potential limits to the reconstructibility of quantum coherence can be translated into measurable experimental constraints. It introduces a minimal phenomenological framework for testing possible structural limits to the reconstructibility of quantum coherence in the context of OFID-G. Rather than proposing a new dynamical model, the approach defines an operational residual quantity after calibration of environmental decoherence, and introduces minimal parametrizations of this residual as a function of experimentally controllable parameters. Two generic behaviors are considered: a continuous residual contribution leading to an irreducible floor, and a threshold-like transition beyond a critical parameter value. This framework allows null experimental results to be translated into quantitative constraints, providing a direct interface between conceptual hypotheses and experimental methodologies in mesoscopic quantum systems. This work complements previous experimental proposals by providing a minimal parameterization layer suitable for interpretation and constraint-setting. In line with standard approaches to parameter estimation in quantum experiments, the framework enables systematic constraint-setting from null results.
An operational, dynamics-preserving protocol to test whether quantum coherence reconstructibility in mesoscopic systems is fully captured by calibrated environmental decoherence. A covariance-based deviation Δ is scanned against an effective gravitational parameter Ξ; two signatures — composition invariance and the energy budget (heating/emission) — separate an environmental residual, an objective-collapse mechanism (Diósi–Penrose, CSL), and a structural, energy-conserving residual. A minimal model and a sensitivity forecast for levitated-optomechanics platforms are included. Null results bound residual reconstructibility; a reproducible deviation would test whether any remaining limitation reflects modified dynamics or incomplete local access to the complete physical state.
This memorandum proposes an operational reinterpretation of wavefunction collapse based on the concept of recoverability in open quantum systems. Rather than treating collapse as a fundamentally distinct and discontinuous physical process, this work suggests that it can be understood as a boundary in recoverability—specifically, the regime in which reconstructability becomes effectively negligible under realistic constraints. From this perspective, the transition from quantum to classical behavior is not associated with a singular event, but with the progressive loss of the ability to reconstruct system–environment correlations. This approach does not deny the empirical phenomena associated with quantum measurement, nor does it propose a new physical theory. Instead, it offers a conceptual framework that connects measurement, decoherence, irreversibility, and information loss through the unifying notion of recoverability. By shifting the focus from observability to operational accessibility, this work provides a complementary viewpoint to standard decoherence-based interpretations. In particular, it emphasizes that irreversibility may arise not from the destruction of information, but from the loss of practical access to it. This memorandum is intended as a conceptual extension of the author’s previous work on operational recoverability metrics and is presented as a philosophical perspective rather than a testable physical model.
Entropy-Induced Collapse (EIC) is a theoretical framework that approaches the quantum measurement problem from an information-theoretic perspective. In standard quantum mechanics, the Schrödinger equation describes deterministic unitary evolution of quantum states. However, measurements appear to produce definite classical outcomes. The physical mechanism underlying the transition from coherent quantum superpositions to classical definiteness remains one of the central unresolved issues in the foundations of quantum theory. The Entropy-Induced Collapse framework proposes that collapse-like behavior can be understood as a structural transition in information recoverability rather than as a fundamental stochastic process or a modification of quantum dynamics. In this framework, the global system–environment state evolves unitarily according to the Schrödinger equation. Interactions with the environment progressively distribute phase information across a growing number of environmental degrees of freedom. As long as this information remains recoverable in principle, quantum coherence can be reconstructed. However, once environmental entropy exceeds a critical structural threshold, the information required to reconstruct the coherent state becomes effectively inaccessible. From this perspective, the apparent collapse of the wavefunction corresponds to a transition from recoverable to irrecoverable information rather than to a fundamental dynamical discontinuity. The EIC framework therefore preserves the standard dynamical laws of quantum mechanics while providing a structural explanation for the emergence of classical measurement outcomes. This paper presents the conceptual and structural foundations of the Entropy-Induced Collapse framework. It is the first paper in a four-part research series that develops the EIC framework from theoretical foundations to experimental and engineering implications. The series is organized as follows: 1. Structural entropy threshold for collapse (this paper) 2. Pre-threshold information recoverability dynamics 3. False-collapse statistics in quantum error-correction regimes 4. Experimental architectures and engineering tests of the EIC framework Together, these papers aim to provide a coherent theoretical structure linking quantum measurement, environmental entropy growth, quantum error correction, and experimentally testable diagnostics of collapse-like phenomena.