Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics: Collected Papers on Quantum Philosophy

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Cambridge University Press, Jun 3, 2004 - Science - 248 pages
John Bell FRS was one of the leading expositors and interpreters of modern quantum theory. He is particularly famous for his discovery of the crucial difference between the predictions of conventional quantum mechanics and the implications of local causality, a concept insisted on by Einstein. John Bell's work has played a major role in developing our current understanding of the profound nature of quantum concepts and of the fundamental limitations they impose on the applicability of the classical ideas of space, time and locality. This book includes all of John Bell's published and unpublished papers on the conceptual and philosophical problems of quantum mechanics, including two papers that appeared after the first edition was published. All the papers have been reset, the references put in order and minor corrections made. The book includes a short Preface written by the author for the first edition, and also an introduction by Alain Aspect that puts into context John Bell's enormous contribution to the quantum philosophy debate. This collection will be of interest to graduate students and research workers in physics with an interest in the conceptual foundations of quantum theory. It will also be of value to philosophers of science working in this area. -- 4ème de couverture.
 

Selected pages

Contents

On the problem of hidden variables in quantum mechanics
1
On the EinsteinPodolskyRosen paradox
14
The moral aspect of quantum mechanics
22
Introduction to the hiddenvariable question
29
Subject and object
40
On wave packet reduction in the ColemanHepp model
45
The theory of local beables
52
Locality in quantum mechanics reply to critics
63
de BroglieBohm delayedchoice doubleslit experiment and density matrix
111
Quantum mechanics for cosmologists
117
Bertlmanns socks and the nature of reality
139
On the impossible pilot wave
159
Speakable and unspeakable in quantum mechanics
169
Beables for quantum field theory
173
Six possible worlds of quantum mechanics
181
EPR correlations and EPW distributions
196

How to teach special relativity
67
EinsteinPodolskyRosen experiments
81
The measurement theory of Everett and de Brogttes pilot wave
93
Free variables and local causality
100
Atomiccascade photons and quantummechanical nonlocality
105
Are there quantum jumps?
201
Against measurement
213
La nouvelle cuisine
232
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About the author (2004)

J. S. Bell is a distinguished physicist well known for his work on the conceptual foundations of quantum mechanics, who died in 1990.

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