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Quantum Mechanics and Ordinary Language: The Fuzzy Link

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Peter J. Lewis
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Abstract

It is widely acknowledged that the link between quantum language and ordinary language must be “fuzzier” than the traditional eigenstate-eigenvalue link. In the context of spontaneous-collapse theories, Albert and Loewer (1996) argue that the form of this fuzzy link is a matter of convention, and can be freely chosen to minimize anomalies for those theories. I defend the position that the form of the link is empirical, and could be such as to render collapse theories idle. This means that defenders of spontaneous-collapse theories must gamble that the actual form of the link renders such theories tenable.

Type
Interpretations of Quantum Mechanics
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 70 , Issue 5: Proceedings of the 2002 Biennial Meeting of The Philosophy of Science Association. Part I: Contributed Papers , December 2003 , pp. 1437 - 1446
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

‡

I would like to thank Jeff Barrett, Jeremy Butterfield, P. D. Magnus, and Bradley Monton for helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper.

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