Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T17:31:36.120Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Are Probabilism and Special Relativity Incompatible?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Nicholas Maxwell
Nicholas Maxwell*
Affiliation:
Department of the History and Philosophy of Science, University College London
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In this paper I expound an argument which seems to establish that probabilism and special relativity are incompatible. I examine the argument critically, and consider its implications for interpretative problems of quantum theory, and for theoretical physics as a whole.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 52 , Issue 1 , March 1985 , pp. 23 - 43
Copyright
Copyright © 1985 by the Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aspect, A.; Grangier, P.; and Roger, G. (1982), “Experimental Realization of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-Bohm Gedankenexperiment: A New Violation of Bell's Inequalities”, Physical Review Letters 49: 91–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feyerabend, P. K. (1968–69), “On a Recent Critique of Complementarity”, Philosophy of Science 35: 309–31; 36: 82–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fonda, L.; Ghirardi, G. C.; and Rimini, A. (1978), “Decay theory of unstable quantum systems”, Reports on Progress in Physics 41: 587–631.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fox, R. (1972), “Tachyons and Quantum Statistics”. Physical Review D5: 329–31.Google Scholar
Gardner, M. R. (1972), “Quantum-Theoretic Realism: Kochen and Specker versus Popper and Einstein”, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 23: 13–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grünbaum, A. (1963), Philosophical Problems of Space and Time. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Harré, R. (1970), The Principles of Scientific Thinking. London: Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harré, R., and Madden, E. H. (1975), Causal Powers. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Hume, D. (1959), A Treatise of Human Nature. Vol. 1. London: Everyman.Google Scholar
Laudan, L. (1981), “A Confutation of Convergent Realism”, Philosophy of Science 48: 19–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Margenau, H. (1950), The Nature of Physical Reality. New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1968), “Can there be Necessary Connections between Successive Events?” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 19: 1–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1972), “A New Look at the Quantum Mechanical Problem of Measurement”, American Journal of Physics 40: 1431–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1973), “The Problem of Measurement—Real or Imaginary?” American Journal of Physics 41: 1022–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1974), “The Rationality of Scientific Discovery”, Philosophy of Science 41: 123–53, 247–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1975), “Does the Minimal Statistical Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics Resolve the Measurement Problem?” Methodology and Science 8: 84–101.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1976a), “Towards a Micro Realistic Version of Quantum Mechanics”, Foundations of Physics 6: 275–92, 661–76.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1976b), What's Wrong With Science? London: Bran's Head Books.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1979), “Induction, Simplicity and Scientific Progress”, Scientia 114: 629–53.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1980), “Science, Reason, Knowledge and Wisdom: A Critique of Specialism”, Inquiry 23: 19–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1982), “Instead of Particles and Fields: A Micro Realistic Quantum ‘Smearon’ Theory”, Foundations of Physics 12: 607–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1984), From Knowledge to Wisdom. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Popper, K. R. (1957), “The Propensity Interpretation of the Calculus of Probability and the Quantum Theory”, in Observation and Interpretation in the Philosophy of Physics, Körner, S. (ed.). London: Butterworths Scientific Publications, pp. 65–70.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1959), “The Propensity Interpretation of Probability”, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 10: 25–42.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1963), “Three Views Concerning Human Knowledge”, in Conjectures and Refutations. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, pp. 97–119.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1967), “Quantum Mechanics without ‘The Observer‘”, in Quantum Mechanics and Reality, Bunge, M. (ed.). Berlin: Springer.Google Scholar
Maxwell, N. (1982), Quantum Theory and the Schism in Physics. London: Hutchinson.Google Scholar
Redhead, M. L. G. (1983), “Nonlocality and Peaceful Coexistence”, in Space, Time and Causality, Swinburne, R. (ed.). Dordrecht: D. Reidel, pp. 151–89.Google Scholar
Swinburne, R. (ed.) (1974), The Justification of Induction. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
van Fraassen, B. C. (1980), The Scientific Image. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar