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Van Fraassen on Preparation and Measurement

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Laura Ruetsche
Laura Ruetsche*
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
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Abstract

Van Fraassen’s 1991 modal interpretation of Quantum Mechanics offers accounts of measurement and state preparation. I argue that both accounts overlook a class of interactions I call General Unitary Measurements, or GUMs. Ironically, GUMs are significant for van Fraassen’s account of measurement because they challenge it, and significant for his account of preparation because they simplify it. Van Fraassen’s oversight prompts a question about modal interpretations: developed to account for ideal measurement outcomes, can they consistently account as well for the whole horizon of laboratory practices by which we investigate QM?

Type
Modal Interpretations of Quantum Theory
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 63 , Issue S3 , 1996 , pp. S338 - S346
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1996

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Footnotes

†

I am obliged to Kate Bedard, John Easman, and Paul Teller.

‡

Department of Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260.

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