Explaining Bohmian Mechanics: Wavefunction, Pilot Wave & Particles

[JustinLevy]

I do not understand why (apparrently) so many people on this board prefer the Bohm interpretation. To have more meaningful discussion, I tried to refresh my memory on the details and read some about it. Unfortunately, Bell's "unspeakable in quantum mechanics" book was not very helpful to me. Even stranger was the wikipedia page which, if it's definitions are correct, leads Bohmian mechanics to be distinguishable from QM since it defines the momentum operator differently.

My understanding was this:
In non-relativistic QM, the state of a system can be represented by the wavefunction, which can be written as a function of all the particles positions (well, and spins). The norm of the wavefunction is defined to be the probability density, and the wavefunction evolves according to the Schrodinger equation.

In Bohmian mechanics, there is also a wavefunction (pilot wave) which evolves according to the Schrodinger equation. ADDITIONALLY, there are particles which move according to the classical Hamiltonian with an additional "quantum potential" determined by the pilot wave.

Please note: I provided that information to give a 'snapshot' of my current level of understanding Bohmian mechanics and its contrasts with QM. What I wish is for someone to succinctly, and precisely (with math) define and explain what Bohmian mechanics is.

In particular these things confuse me:
What are the "pilot waves" functions of for BM? (since the particles have a definite position and momentum, they can't be functions of that)
And while the particle evolution is effected by the pilot wave, how do the particles effect the pilot wave?
In fact, how do the particles effect anything? Do they effect the potential for other particles, or measurement (which means they would have to affect particles somehow), etc?

 

[Vanadium 50]

I do not understand why (apparrently) so many people on this board prefer the Bohm interpretation.

Because the vast majority of people on the board are amateurs. Amateurs worry about such things.

Professionals, after having spent 3 or more years studying QM in graduate school usually adopt the principle that "QM says if I set up measurement X, I will obtain an ensemble of measurements {X}", rather than worrying about creating a narrative that explains what elements of pre-QM physics survive and what elements do not: i.e. an "interpretation".

Rarely a calculation comes around that looks easy if you think about one interpretation (I am thinking of asymmetric B factories, which is simplest to understand in terms of Copenhagen), and the working physicist will analyze it in terms of whatever works best. Since all interpretations - by definition - give the same answer, they are all equally "real" (and equally unreal).

 

[Dmitry67]

Because the vast majority of people on the board are amateurs. Amateurs worry about such things.

Well, I am pure amateur but I prefer MUH and hence MWI.

But what's about Demistifyer and Ilja? For me they do not look like as amateurs: they have articles submiited to arhiv and they both have/work on some complicated theories.

 

[QuantumBend]

I do not understand why (apparrently) so many people on this board prefer the Bohm interpretation. To have more meaningful discussion, I tried to refresh my memory on the details and read some about it. Unfortunately, Bell's "unspeakable in quantum mechanics" book was not very helpful to me. Even stranger was the wikipedia page which, if it's definitions are correct, leads Bohmian mechanics to be distinguishable from QM since it defines the momentum operator differently.

My understanding was this:
In non-relativistic QM, the state of a system can be represented by the wavefunction, which can be written as a function of all the particles positions (well, and spins). The norm of the wavefunction is defined to be the probability density, and the wavefunction evolves according to the Schrodinger equation.

In Bohmian mechanics, there is also a wavefunction (pilot wave) which evolves according to the Schrodinger equation. ADDITIONALLY, there are particles which move according to the classical Hamiltonian with an additional "quantum potential" determined by the pilot wave.

Please note: I provided that information to give a 'snapshot' of my current level of understanding Bohmian mechanics and its contrasts with QM. What I wish is for someone to succinctly, and precisely (with math) define and explain what Bohmian mechanics is.

In particular these things confuse me:
What are the "pilot waves" functions of for BM? (since the particles have a definite position and momentum, they can't be functions of that)
And while the particle evolution is effected by the pilot wave, how do the particles effect the pilot wave?
In fact, how do the particles effect anything? Do they effect the potential for other particles, or measurement (which means they would have to affect particles somehow), etc?

You make 11 dimension and get string theorums. Bohm need pilots mathematics.

 

[zenith8]

What I wish is for someone to succinctly, and precisely (with math) define and explain what Bohmian mechanics is.

There's a good Cambridge University course on the internet http://www.tcm.phy.cam.ac.uk/~mdt26/pilot_waves.html" . See lecture 1 for a succinct summary.

Because the vast majority of people on the board are amateurs. Amateurs worry about such things.

If he was talking about any other subject Vanadium50 would get penalized for rudeness by the moderators for this - but sadly it's not going to happen. This is what Bohmists have to put up with - for no really good reason other than people following the herd and therefore feeling safe insulting people. Lecture 7 in the course above is quite amusing on this topic. Don't let people like him put you off (though from your tone I suspect you're one of them already, and you're just looking for a quick reason to dismiss it? )..

I think the point is that while you get the same results as regular QM, all the 'weirdness' and 'paradoxes' disappear, and you can derive stuff (like Born's rule) that otherwise have to be postulates. Things like double slit experiments become 'understandable' (in ways that Feynman said no-one could do) and therefore not confusing to students. You might say so what? But how much hot air has been wasted on weirdness discussions over the decades..?

Also, the whole thing about Bell's theorem, nonlocality, the Aspect experiments etc. came out of a study of the Bohm interpretation by Bell (so saying that it's not important to think about interpretations is just nonsense).

Essentially physicists love pretending to be mysterious because it impresses women (substitute previous word with appropriate gender if required). The interpretation offered by pilot-wave theory is so prosaic that the women would think you were a massive nerd and start looking for fighter pilots or reality TV stars instead.

Physicists have been trained to believe that 'no-one understands quantum mechanics' so pilot-wave theory can't be true - but believe me, if one could dismiss it that easily it would have been by now. Remember it was invented almost in its entirety by 1927 (with Bohm adding a few tweaks about measurement theory in 1952) which is why these days one should refer to it as 'pilot-wave theory' rather than Bohmian mechanics or whatever. It was thus invented before Copenhagen itself and came within an ace of being adopted by the mainstream (but unfortunately Bohr and Heisenberg and other leaders were slaves to the logical positivism fashionable at the time and thus did not allow themselves to believe that particles could have 'trajectories' between position detection events).

 

[Ilja]

Even stranger was the wikipedia page which, if it's definitions are correct, leads Bohmian mechanics to be distinguishable from QM since it defines the momentum operator differently.

What are the "pilot waves" functions of for BM? (since the particles have a definite position and momentum, they can't be functions of that)
And while the particle evolution is effected by the pilot wave, how do the particles effect the pilot wave?
In fact, how do the particles effect anything? Do they effect the potential for other particles, or measurement (which means they would have to affect particles somehow), etc?

First about the momentum operator: Momentum measurements have the same results as in quantum theory. But they do not measure mass times velocity of the trajectory, but something else. These two things become identical only in the classical limit.

The wave function is a function on the configuration space Q, that means, the space of all possible configurations of the universe (or the particular toy universe of the given theory).

Then, the action equals reaction symmetry does not hold: The configuration (the particles) is influenced by the wave function, but not reverse. The particles influence each other because the position q_1 of particle 1 appears in the guiding equation for particle 2

$$\frac{d}{dt} q_2 = \frac{d}{dq_2} \Im\hbar\ln \Psi(q_1,q_2)$$

The most important thing "influenced" by the "particles" are we ourself: Our own configuration is part of the configuration of the universe.

 

[QuantumBend]

The most important thing "influenced" by the "particles" are we ourself: Our own configuration is part of the configuration of the universe.

Why neutrinas go through WHOLE WORLD not banging? No good.

 

[malawi_glenn]

Why neutrinas go through WHOLE WORLD not banging? No good.

What? Can you please specify what banging means in physical terms?

 

[malawi_glenn]

How/can does Bohm Interpretation and formulation result in Quantum Field Theories? Is there relativistic formulations of Bohm-quantum mechanics?

As far as I know, this is where Bohm becomes really "nasty".

Also according to what I know, Bohm must use a different notation of probability so that Occam's razor can't be applied to it.

But I am really considering to follow that course that zenith8 proposed, seems to be really good.

 

[QuantumBend]

What? Can you please specify what banging means in physical terms?

OK, It better crashes when neutrinas go through EARTH. Not crashing 10000000000 atom.

 

[Ilja]

How/can does Bohm Interpretation and formulation result in Quantum Field Theories? Is there relativistic formulations of Bohm-quantum mechanics?

As far as I know, this is where Bohm becomes really "nasty".

Also according to what I know, Bohm must use a different notation of probability so that Occam's razor can't be applied to it.

But I am really considering to follow that course that zenith8 proposed, seems to be really good.

For field theories, it seems most natural to use a field ontology. We have not particles, but fields, elements of some space of field configurations. The trajectory is, then, a field on space depending on time. For canonical field theories, this is a straightforward construction, even in the relativistic domain. The problematic parts is not relativity, but theories which do not have a canonical space of field configurations. In particular fermions. There are several different proposals how to handle fermions.

My own proposal is to use canonical quantization for fermion fields too - contrary to standard wisdom, this appears possible, as I have shown in ilja-schmelzer.de/papers/clm.pdf (published in Foundations of Physics this year). For this quantization scheme, the straightforward Bohmianization scheme works.

The problems are metaphysical. Existing proposals (except my own;-))) are not really beautiful. Empirical evidence is, instead, almost unproblematic. (One does not even need a Bohmian theory for fermions, because all what one needs is that macroscopic states differ. But they already differ if one considers only the EM field.)

Your remark about Bohm's notion of probability I do not understand, there is nothing special about it. There is some quantum equilibrium, which can be derived in analogy to thermodynamics, and which has, from point of view of probability theory, the same status.

 

[malawi_glenn]

OK, It better crashes when neutrinas go through EARTH. Not crashing 10000000000 atom.

what in the name of God are you speaking of?

NEUTRINOS have a low probability to interact with matter since they only do so with the weak force.

can you please try to write greater precision so that one can understand what you are saying and what the points of your arguments are.

 

[jtbell]

Please, people, let's keep this discussion civil, without disparaging "snipes" at interpretations that you don't like, or at people who favor them. Otherwise we'll be tempted to ban discussion of QM interpretations, just like we ban discussion of religion.

 

[Vanadium 50]

Because the vast majority of people on the board are amateurs. Amateurs worry about such things.

If he was talking about any other subject Vanadium50 would get penalized for rudeness by the moderators for this - but sadly it's not going to happen.

Go ahead, click "report", if you think I have crossed a line.

I don't think the word "amateur" is rude - it means someone who does something for the love of it, rather than for pay, and derives from the latin amat, (s)he loves. I believe that that statement is true.

As far as the second half of my statement goes, there are thousands of pages written on QM and its applications every month in journals. (About 1500 such articles are submitted every month on QM or applications). Far less than 1% of these papers are about interpretations (0.1% or so in 2009 have the word "interpretation" in the title, and a good fraction of those - perhaps half - are written by people without giving their affiliation), which contrasts with maybe 30% on the QM section of PF. One cannot help but draw the conclusion that this is a topic that amateurs find far more interesting than professionals.

 

[DrChinese]

I do not understand why (apparrently) so many people on this board prefer the Bohm interpretation. To have more meaningful discussion, I tried to refresh my memory on the details and read some about it. Unfortunately, Bell's "unspeakable in quantum mechanics" book was not very helpful to me. Even stranger was the wikipedia page which, if it's definitions are correct, leads Bohmian mechanics to be distinguishable from QM since it defines the momentum operator differently...

What I wish is for someone to succinctly, and precisely (with math) define and explain what Bohmian mechanics is.

You've probably already seen these, if not:

Passon (2006): What you always wanted to know about BM...

Nikolic (2006): QM: Myths and facts (supports BM)

Passon (2004): Why isn't every physicist a Bohmian?

I have followed your comments about the philosophical issues around the study of Bohmian/dbb/Pilot Wave theories, and I think they match very closely my own thoughts. That is why I have tried to engage some of the knowledgeable members of this board to teach me more. This school is very dedicated, and the results of Bell experiments *could* be considered as pointing us towards a non-local theory (see Norsen reference below). But I can't believe, in the long run, it makes sense to construct an interpretation that gives identical results as what is already taught in textbooks. So my interest is to find some delta, and I personally think a truly different interpretation will yield a different - and hopefully testable - prediction eventually. That is why I wonder about radioactive decay, virtual fields, etc.

Norsen (2006): Against 'Realism' This article is one that I am in strong disagreement with, and Norsen and I have debated this point endlessly on this board in the past. Nonetheless, if you accept Norsen's argument, then the Bohmian viewpoint makes infinitely more sense. However, I completely reject the idea that Bell's Theorem does not include Realism as an assumption as it is easily to point to. Unfortunately, Bell did not clearly label it in his original paper and his book (Speakable... etc) is very vague on this subject (as Bell had obviously moved closer towards Bohmian ideas by that time). But none of that changes anything, and I can't think of any non-Bohmian that agrees with Norsen's hypothesis. And certainly I can't think any anyone actually doing experimental work in this area (a la Zeilinger and many others) who have ever mentioned that Bell's Theorem presumes non-locality.

 

[QMessiah]

DrChinese, what interpretation do you "believe" in?
I hate how intepretations have become like a religion...but, which do you prefer?I think Norsen's arguments are pretty sound, this paper was also published in peer reviewed Foundations of Physics.

 

[Vanadium 50]

what interpretation do you "believe" in?

I think that question points out exactly why professionals aren't interested in this at the level amateurs are. If the various interpretations give identical results, there is no scientific basis for distinguishing between them. Indeed, who's to say that only one can be right? It's like asking whether you believe in configuration space or momentum space: both will give the same answers. Often one is less work than the others.

 

[samalkhaiat]

It's like asking whether you believe in configuration space or momentum space: both will give the same answers.

Then, Shouldn't this be true in the Bohm formulation as well? :rofl::rofl:

sam

 

[p764rds]

I think that question points out exactly why professionals aren't interested in this at the level amateurs are. If the various interpretations give identical results, there is no scientific basis for distinguishing between them. Indeed, who's to say that only one can be right? It's like asking whether you believe in configuration space or momentum space: both will give the same answers. Often one is less work than the others.

I am sure you are correct, but I need educating on this:

1 Apple = 10 Apples - (a flying virtual elephant ate 9)
Its mathematically correct but cannot be physically correct. Why are we allowed to do it? (e.g. let time go backwards and subtract the effects out at the end, or let's have some virtual particles that may not exist).

 

[feynmann]

Because the vast majority of people on the board are amateurs. Amateurs worry about such things.

Professionals, after having spent 3 or more years studying QM in graduate school usually adopt the principle that "QM says if I set up measurement X, I will obtain an ensemble of measurements {X}", rather than worrying about creating a narrative that explains what elements of pre-QM physics survive and what elements do not: i.e. an "interpretation".

Rarely a calculation comes around that looks easy if you think about one interpretation (I am thinking of asymmetric B factories, which is simplest to understand in terms of Copenhagen), and the working physicist will analyze it in terms of whatever works best. Since all interpretations - by definition - give the same answer, they are all equally "real" (and equally unreal).

Do you think Gell-Mann and Weinberg are amateurs? They both disagree with Bohr's <Copenhagen interpretation>

Niels Bohr brainwashed a whole generation of physicists into believing that the problem (of the interpretation of quantum mechanics) had been solved fifty years ago. ( Murray Gell-Mann, Noble Prize acceptance speech, 1976)

Steven Weinberg in "Einstein's Mistakes", Physics Today, November 2005, page 31, said:
Bohr's version of quantum mechanics was deeply flawed, but not for the reason Einstein thought. The Copenhagen interpretation describes what happens when an observer makes a measurement, but the observer and the act of measurement are themselves treated classically. This is surely wrong: Physicists and their apparatus must be governed by the same quantum mechanical rules that govern everything else in the universe. But these rules are expressed in terms of a wave function (or, more precisely, a state vector) that evolves in a perfectly deterministic way. So where do the probabilistic rules of the Copenhagen interpretation come from?
Considerable progress has been made in recent years toward the resolution of the problem, which I cannot go into here. It is enough to say that neither Bohr nor Einstein had focused on the real problem with quantum mechanics. The Copenhagen rules clearly work, so they have to be accepted. But this leaves the task of explaining them by applying the deterministic equation for the evolution of the wave function, the Schrödinger equation, to observers and their apparatus.

 

[isabelle]

Are there any exactly solvable models in Bohmian mechanics?

 

[Hans de Vries]

Why neutrinas go through WHOLE WORLD not banging? No good.

What? Can you please specify what banging means in physical terms?

Are neutrinas of the female type species? I suddenly realize that
elementary particle physics is male chauvinist since all particles
are male ...o's instead of female ...a's

Now when somebody comes up with a female species he complains about:

"not banging? No good"


Regards, Hans.

 

[Hans de Vries]

Steven Weinberg in "Einstein's Mistakes", Physics Today, November 2005, page 31, said:
Bohr's version of quantum mechanics was deeply flawed, but not for the reason Einstein thought. The Copenhagen interpretation describes what happens when an observer makes a measurement, but the observer and the act of measurement are themselves treated classically. This is surely wrong: Physicists and their apparatus must be governed by the same quantum mechanical rules that govern everything else in the universe. But these rules are expressed in terms of a wave function (or, more precisely, a state vector) that evolves in a perfectly deterministic way. So where do the probabilistic rules of the Copenhagen interpretation come from?
Considerable progress has been made in recent years toward the resolution of the problem, which I cannot go into here. It is enough to say that neither Bohr nor Einstein had focused on the real problem with quantum mechanics. The Copenhagen rules clearly work, so they have to be accepted. But this leaves the task of explaining them by applying the deterministic equation for the evolution of the wave function, the Schrödinger equation, to observers and their apparatus.

The "Professionals" either give up after a while, postpone to a later date, or
struggle in silence to find and interpretation, "not ready to go into details yet"
as Weinberg here.

The "Amateurs" are too optimistic because they've not yet struggled long
enough, or they are just simply worried that physicist, in general, really buy
all these "strange interpretations", which is unjustified.

Nevertheless, the discussion should go on, as long as takes...Regards, Hans

 

[humanino]

I asked for references in the past about that : what does Bohm-Broglie say about scaling violation in QCD ? This is an established fact. How about Hawking radiation ?

 

[DrChinese]

The truth is, there are people who come here who try to push a non-standard point of view without having done the requisiste research first. There is nothing wrong with having a non-standard point of view, per se. The issue is whether it should be pushed as the "truth". The general practice is to identify opinions, interpretations, etc. as such - especially if they tend to be "non-standard". That allows people who otherwise cannot identify standard from non-standard to form their own opinions.

Vanadium 50 is not trying to insult anyone. People should be able to determine what their own level of knowledge and expertise is. We are very fortunate to have some very knowledgeable and talented people contributing time to this board, and they do not feel the need to identify their expertise, degrees, experience, etc. But the truth is, for this board to serve its function effectively, there will be participants that are more familiar with theory and experiment, and others that are less familiar with the same. That should be obvious, and it should also be obvious that things work better when kept on a more professsional level.

JustinLevy asked about the Bohmian Intepretation, and wanted to know why it is pursued. It is a legitimate question, with a legitimate answer (see my references). I personally don't see the popularity (or lack thereof, actually, as should be clear from those references) as much of an issue either way. It is a legitimate school of thought, and one day we will want to know if we live in a universe with non-local forces or not. So we will need this work to be done either way - right or wrong - to determine if non-locality is part of the framework. So I personally applaud those who work in this area, they are putting their beliefs to the test by investing precious time.

 

[DrChinese]

Do you think Gell-Mann and Weinberg are amateurs? They both disagree with Bohr's <Copenhagen interpretation>
...

FYI: Weinberg is famously one of the practical types, and has made his views well known - including in the reference you cited. So that would actually be a vote for Vanadium 50's position. It also would echo the concerns that JustinLevy had which started this thread.

Not trying to come down on one side or the other, just pointing out that we will probably fulfill the objective our moderators want us to pursue if we focus on the scientific arguments. There are naturally going to be big names on various sides of various interpretations. The Bohmian interpretation is a legitimate subject of research, but one which has yet to produce a big "win". JustinLevy is asking what the attraction is, and I think the question deserves a straight answer. I hope the references I supplied will get anyone started on the matter who wants to know more. I got these from some of the BIers here via another thread. (I should not be considered a subject matter expert on BM/dBB, I am learning too and trying to see what it has to offer.)

 

[Ilja]

I think that question points out exactly why professionals aren't interested in this at the level amateurs are. If the various interpretations give identical results, there is no scientific basis for distinguishing between them. Indeed, who's to say that only one can be right? It's like asking whether you believe in configuration space or momentum space: both will give the same answers. Often one is less work than the others.

Interpretations are the starting points for future theories, so there is a point of preferring one or some of them if one tries to develop some more fundamental theories.

Of course, for most physicists this is not the job they get paid for. Their job are some applied quantum problems which are interpretation-independent. But the real great revolutions in science have not been done without care about metaphysics and methodology.

So, in some sense the question is what you want to reach in science. If you want to play small, take some application and don't care about fundamental physics. If you want to play big, you have to care about foundational questions.

 

[Ilja]

But I can't believe, in the long run, it makes sense to construct an interpretation that gives identical results as what is already taught in textbooks. So my interest is to find some delta, and I personally think a truly different interpretation will yield a different - and hopefully testable - prediction eventually. That is why I wonder about radioactive decay, virtual fields, etc.

I think it makes a lot of sense to clarify the foundational questions. And in particular to clarify if there are reasons to give up such fundamental principles like realism, causality and so on.

Norsen (2006): Against 'Realism' This article is one that I am in strong disagreement with, and Norsen and I have debated this point endlessly on this board in the past.

I like this paper. Even if I'm not "against realism" but consider myself as a defender of realism. The notion of realism I defend is the metaphysical one of this paper.

Nonetheless, if you accept Norsen's argument, then the Bohmian viewpoint makes infinitely more sense. However, I completely reject the idea that Bell's Theorem does not include Realism as an assumption as it is easily to point to.

There is something one has to assume. But this "something" is an extremely weak assumption.

And if one rejects this very weak notion of realism, one does not obtain very much. The weak notion of relativistic symmetry, which is only about observables, is compatible with pilot wave theory and this weak notion of realism anyway. Thus, the weak notion of relativistic symmetry does not give a reason to reject realism. And the strong, realistic notion, which requires that reality has Lorentz-symmetry, has to be given up anyway, with or without metaphysical realism.

So, while I continue to think (after Norsen) that there is some hypothesis worth to be named "realism" and used in Bell's theorem, I think the case for not giving up this hypothesis is very strong. And if we don't give it up, we have to accept non-locality, or a preferred frame.

But none of that changes anything, and I can't think of any non-Bohmian that agrees with Norsen's hypothesis. And certainly I can't think any anyone actually doing experimental work in this area (a la Zeilinger and many others) who have ever mentioned that Bell's Theorem presumes non-locality.

I prefer to care about content arguments instead of ad hominem arguments. What the people working in certain domains think is a sociological question, not a physical one. And the situation in science today is one of extremal uncertainty of the working conditions (with jobs which end after a few years, which is much more uncertain than everything else one can imagine). The ideal of independent science is something very different from what we find today in professional science.

 

[DrChinese]

So, while I continue to think (after Norsen) that there is some hypothesis worth to be named "realism" and used in Bell's theorem, I think the case for not giving up this hypothesis is very strong. And if we don't give it up, we have to accept non-locality, or a preferred frame.

If you would like to discuss the pros and cons of Norsen's paper (and I would be happy to do so), we should start another thread for that.

My point about Norsen's paper is that IF you accepted his basic argument - as you say you do - THEN you naturally wind up with a favorable perspective on Bohmian interpretations. That is not the only way to get to that point, but I think it is natural. Because then, you essentially view Bell's Theorem as a rejection of locality - as Norsen essentially does, since he thinks that "naive realism" (his words) is not so relevant to Bell's Theorem.

(By the way, I laughed when Norsen attached the word "naive" to a respectable viewpoint. Apparently, no one bothered to explain to Einstein that his cherished viewpoint was in fact naive. Anyway, realism - robust, healthy and meaningful - is fully present in Bell's Theorem as an assumption and there is nothing weak about it. It is difficult to imagine how Bell's famous paper can be considered absent the arguments presented in the EPR paper - in which the fmaous phrase "elements of reality" is defined - given the title Bell chose. I think Bell could have labeled his realism assumption more clearly, but that does not change the argument or its impact.)

 

[Vanadium 50]

Interpretations are the starting points for future theories

I'm not sure I buy this. I recognize that people would disagree with me on this (I once had dinner with my friend and erstwhile collaborator John Cramer who tried the whole time to persuade me to adopt his point of view) but I don't think this strategy has borne much fruit in the past.

I think history has shown that theoretical developments tend to be driven by either internal inconsistencies in the theory, or disagreements with the data, rather than different interpretations of the same theory.

 

[DrChinese]

I'm not sure I buy this. I recognize that people would disagree with me on this (I once had dinner with my friend and erstwhile collaborator John Cramer who tried the whole time to persuade me to adopt his point of view) but I don't think this strategy has borne much fruit in the past.

I agree, history shows there is no obvious pattern regarding periods of rapid scientific advances.

I know this is off-topic, but does Cramer (or maybe yourself) have anything new on the horizon regarding quantum erasers, experimental tests of the Transactional Interpretation (Absorber theory) or similar going on? Last I saw, he was talking about a variation on Dopfer's setup.

 

[Vanadium 50]

He's been trying to work on these experimental tests. As you probably know, there is some dispute as to exactly what these experiments measure, and if different interpretations do, in fact, give different results.

 

[Ilja]

I'm not sure I buy this. I recognize that people would disagree with me on this (I once had dinner with my friend and erstwhile collaborator John Cramer who tried the whole time to persuade me to adopt his point of view) but I don't think this strategy has borne much fruit in the past.

I think history has shown that theoretical developments tend to be driven by either internal inconsistencies in the theory, or disagreements with the data, rather than different interpretations of the same theory.

The measurement problem is, of course, an internal inconsistency of some interpretations of quantum theory. Thus, if pilot wave theory leads to some future development, one can also claim that it was driven by internal inconsistencies of standard quantum theory.

I'm not a specialist in history, but have my own experience: I have started with an interpretation of GR and after this switched to an alternative theory of gravity.

 

[Demystifier]

How/can does Bohm Interpretation and formulation result in Quantum Field Theories? Is there relativistic formulations of Bohm-quantum mechanics?

For the second question, see
http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/0811.1905 [accepted for publication in Int. J. Quantum Inf.]
For the first question, wait a few days to see how the results in the paper above can be extended to QFT.

 

[Demystifier]

I asked for references in the past about that : what does Bohm-Broglie say about scaling violation in QCD ? This is an established fact.

It says the same as standard QCD says, nothing new.