- 29,089
- 20,712
I don't see how that definition on SD is enough to explain QM results. The key missing element is correlation between seemingly independent physical systems. For what it's worth, Wikipedia agrees with me on this:Lord Jestocost said:He is completely right. Scientists who make a lot of noise about a “superdeterministic world” often don’t realize that they themselves are an included part of this world. When using the term "superdeterminism", one should know how it is defined. Gerard 't Hooft in "The Cellular Automaton Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics":
"If a theory is deterministic all the way, it implies that not only all observed phenomena, but also the observers themselves are controlled by deterministic laws. They certainly have no ‘free will’, their actions all have roots in the past, even the distant past. ... The notion that, also the actions by experimenters and observers are controlled by deterministic laws, is called superdeterminism." [Italics in original, LJ]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdeterminism
"The term superdeterminism is misleading. Superdeterministic models are deterministic in the usual sense. But in addition to being deterministic, they also postulate correlations between the state that is measured and the measurement setting. "
For example, suppose experimenter A chooses something to do with English football results and experimenter B chooses Scottish football results to obtain data for an Bell-type experiment. It's one thing to say that these results are predetermined. It's quite another to say that they are correlated - in just the right way to make QM appear to be true.
Not least, because data cannot be correlated with all other data in every possible way. SD (to explain QM) requires that a very specific set of correlations emerge. For example, if we do the experiment one way it might require that Celtic and Chelsea have results that are correlated in some way. But, then, we change the way we use the data and from that moment on, Celtic and Chelsea have results that must be correlated in some different way.
SD says that some law of physics maintains this bizarre interrelationship where, for example, Celtic's winning streak comes to an end at precisely the time that it needs to in order that the data when used by the experimenters is correlated with photons in an experiment.
It's not that football results, experimental decisions and photon polarizations are all pre-determined; it's that they are all correlated in order to make QM appear true. It's not clear what form the laws of nature would have to take to ensure such correlated interrelationships.
Last edited: