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Causal Analysis of Hidden Variables

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2022

Patrick Suppes
Patrick Suppes*
Affiliation:
Stanford University
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Extract

My contribution to this symposium is focused on the retreat from strong conditions of causality that have been forced upon us by quantum mechanics. My intent is to describe in more or less successive stages the retreat from the paradise of deteministic causation. This retreat has taken place through a thicket of quantum-nechanical details. It is ny intention to describe the general principles involved but to refer to the literature for proofs and full technical elaboration, even of matters that are crucial to the conceptual development.

The history of the efforts to prove or disprove the possibility of hidden variables begins at least with von Neumann and includes important work by Kochen and Specker and others, but much of the recent analysis has centered around Bell's inequality and related results. In spite of its importance and significance I shall ignore this earlier history and begin with these recent discussions.

Type
Part X. Locality and Hidden Variables
Information
PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association , Volume 1980 , Issue 2: Volume Two: Symposia and Invited Papers 1980 , 1980 , pp. 563 - 571
Copyright
Copyright © 1981 by the Philosophy of Science Association

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References

Bell, J.S. (1964). “On the Einstein Podolsky Rosen Paradox. Physics 195-200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bell, J.S. (1966). “On the Problem of Hidden Variables in Quantum Mechanics.” Reviews of Modern Physics 38: 447-452.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bell, J.S. (1971). “Introduction to the Hidden-Variable Question.” In Foundations of Quantum Mechanics. Edited by d'Espagnat, B.. New York: Academic Press. Pages 171-181.Google Scholar
Diaconis, P. (1977). “Finite Forms of de Finetti's Theorem on Exchangeability.” Synthese 36: 271-281.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Suppes, P. and Zanotti, M. (1976). “On the Determinism of Hidden Variable Theories with Strict Correlation and Conditional Statistical Independence of Observables.” In Logic and Probability in Quantum Mechanics. Edited by P. Suppes. Dordrecht: D. Reidel Publishing Company. Pages 445-455.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Suppes, P. and Zanotti, M.. (1980). “A New Proof of the Impossibility of Hidden Variables Using the Principles of Exchangeability and Identity of Conditional Distribution.” In Studies in the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics. Edited by P., Suppes. East Lansing, Michigan: Philosophy of Science Association. Pages 173-191.Google Scholar
Wigner, E.P., (1970). “On Hidden Variables and Quantum Mechanical Probabilities.” American Journal of Physics 38: 1005-1009.CrossRefGoogle Scholar