Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of papers on quantum philosophy by J. S. Bell
- Preface to the first edition
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction: John Bell and the second quantum revolution
- 1 On the problem of hidden variables in quantum mechanics
- 2 On the Einstein–Podolsky–Rosen paradox
- 3 The moral aspect of quantum mechanics
- 4 Introduction to the hidden-variable question
- 5 Subject and object
- 6 On wave packet reduction in the Coleman–Hepp model
- 7 The theory of local beables
- 8 Locality in quantum mechanics: reply to critics
- 9 How to teach special relativity
- 10 Einstein–Podolsky–Rosen experiments
- 11 The measurement theory of Everett and de Broglie's pilot wave
- 12 Free variables and local causality
- 13 Atomic-cascade photons and quantum-mechanical nonlocality
- 14 de Broglie–Bohm, delayed-choice double-slit experiment, and density matrix
- 15 Quantum mechanics for cosmologists
- 16 Bertlmann's socks and the nature of reality
- 17 On the impossible pilot wave
- 18 Speakable and unspeakable in quantum mechanics
- 19 Beables for quantum field theory
- 20 Six possible worlds of quantum mechanics
- 21 EPR correlations and EPW distributions
- 22 Are there quantum jumps?
- 23 Against ‘measurement’
- 24 La nouvelle cuisine
12 - Free variables and local causality
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 April 2011
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of papers on quantum philosophy by J. S. Bell
- Preface to the first edition
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction: John Bell and the second quantum revolution
- 1 On the problem of hidden variables in quantum mechanics
- 2 On the Einstein–Podolsky–Rosen paradox
- 3 The moral aspect of quantum mechanics
- 4 Introduction to the hidden-variable question
- 5 Subject and object
- 6 On wave packet reduction in the Coleman–Hepp model
- 7 The theory of local beables
- 8 Locality in quantum mechanics: reply to critics
- 9 How to teach special relativity
- 10 Einstein–Podolsky–Rosen experiments
- 11 The measurement theory of Everett and de Broglie's pilot wave
- 12 Free variables and local causality
- 13 Atomic-cascade photons and quantum-mechanical nonlocality
- 14 de Broglie–Bohm, delayed-choice double-slit experiment, and density matrix
- 15 Quantum mechanics for cosmologists
- 16 Bertlmann's socks and the nature of reality
- 17 On the impossible pilot wave
- 18 Speakable and unspeakable in quantum mechanics
- 19 Beables for quantum field theory
- 20 Six possible worlds of quantum mechanics
- 21 EPR correlations and EPW distributions
- 22 Are there quantum jumps?
- 23 Against ‘measurement’
- 24 La nouvelle cuisine
Summary
It has been argued that quantum mechanics is not locally causal and cannot be embedded in a locally causal theory. That conclusion depends on treating certain experimental parameters, typically the orientations of polarization filters, as free variables. Roughly speaking it is supposed that an experimenter is quite free to choose among the various possibilities offered by his equipment. But it might be that this apparent freedom is illusory. Perhaps experimental parameters and experimental results are both consequences, or partially so, of some common hidden mechanism. Then the apparent non-locality could be simulated.
This possibility is the starting point of a paper by Clauser, Home and Shimony (CHS hereafter), which is valuable in particular for a careful mathematical formulation of the assumption which excludes such a conspiracy. In this connection they severely criticize my own ‘theory of local beables’ (B hereafter). Much of their criticism is perfectly just. In B there were jumps in the argument, and the assumption in question was not stated at the appropriate place, but only later and inadequately. However, I do not agree with CHS that this assumption, when carefully formulated, is an unreasonable one.
I will organize these remarks around the three phrases in which I belatedly formulated the hypothesis in B, Section 8.
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- Information
- Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum MechanicsCollected Papers on Quantum Philosophy, pp. 100 - 104Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2004
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