Tuesday, May 8, 2012

1111.3328 (Matthew F. Pusey et al.)

On the reality of the quantum state    [PDF]

Matthew F. Pusey, Jonathan Barrett, Terry Rudolph
Quantum states are the key mathematical objects in quantum theory. It is therefore surprising that physicists have been unable to agree on what a quantum state represents. One possibility is that a pure quantum state corresponds directly to reality. But there is a long history of suggestions that a quantum state (even a pure state) represents only knowledge or information of some kind. Here we show that any model in which a quantum state represents mere information about an underlying physical state of the system must make predictions which contradict those of quantum theory.
View original: http://arxiv.org/abs/1111.3328

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