Heisenberg Interpretation vs Objective Collapse

[rodsika]

　
We know Copenhagen settles for computational rules connecting human observations rather than striving to comprehend the nature of the underlying reality. Heisenberg eventually did try to form a coherence picture of what is actually happening. But how come this Heisenberg Interpretation is not widely known? Henry Stapp said most practicing quantum physicist hold that view yet I never hear them (you) state this. Is he right? What do you think of the following? It's from Henry Stapp "Mind, Matter and Quantum Mechanics" (my comments follows it):

"In Heisenberg’s picture, which is the one informally adopted by most practicing quantum physicists, the classical world of material particles, evolving in accordance with local deterministic mathematical laws, is replaced by the Heisenberg state of the universe. This state can be pictured as a complicated wave, which, like its classical counterpart, evolves in accordance with local deterministic laws of motion. However, this Heisenberg state represents not the actual physical universe itself, in the normal sense, but merely a set of "objective tendencies", or "propensities", connected to an impending actual event. The connection is this: for each of the alternative possible forms that this impending event might take, the Heisenberg state specifies a propensity, or tendency, for the event to take that form. The choice between these alternative possible forms is asserted to be governed by "pure chance", weighted by these propensities.

The actual event itself is simply an abrupt change in the Heisenberg state: it is sometimes called "the collapse of the wave function". The new state describes the tendencies associated with the next actual event. This leads to an alternating succession of states and events, in which the state at each stage describes the propensities associated with the event that follows it. In this way the universe becomes controlled in part by strictly deterministic mathematical laws, and in part by mathematically defined "pure chance".

The actual events become, in Heisenberg’s ontology, the fundamental entities from which the evolving universe is built. The properties of these actual events are determined by the quantum formalism. These properties are remarkable: they lead to a quantum world profoundly different from the one pictured in classical physics.

<snip>

By introducing in this way a quantum ontology, and thus departing from the purely epistemological stance of the strictly orthodox Copenhagen interpretation, one can remove the subjective human observer from the quantum description of the physical world and speak directly about the actual dispositions of the measuring devices, rather than the knowledge of the observer. Thus the moon can be said to be "really there" even when nobody is looking. And Schroedinger’s cat is, actually, either dead or alive."

Well. In Objective Collapse. They have to make it spontaneous to avoid observers mediated collapse. But Stapp said Heisenberg can make it work by returning to the picture of measuring devices and objective collapse without invoking spontaneous collapse like in the GRW model. Heisenberg picture may be the best of all worlds because it retains the collapse model and measuring device and making it objective rather than just calculational tool. What do you think about it? How is your objection?

 

[rodsika]

Werner Heisenberg has stated this:

"In the experiments about atomic events we have to do with things and facts, the phenomena that are just as real as any phenomena in daily life. But the atoms or elementary particles themselves are not real; they form a world of potentialities or possibilities rather than of things or facts".

When did he exactly said it? Was it after Born discovered the probability nature of the wave function or is it during the formulation of the Matrix Mechanics? Could he be right? Can anyone familiar with this please share his thought processes about this and the context of it all? Thanks.

 

[rodsika]

In Heisenberg interpretation, the unmeasured world ACTUALLY is what quantum theory represents it to be: a superposition of mere possibilities (Heisenberg called them potentia), unrealized tendencies for action. Nick said "an unobserved quantum entity possesses "more reality" than that available to ordinary objects because it can entertain in potentia a multitude of contradictory attributes which would be impossible for any fully actualized entity." That's right. And the magic of measurement grants one of these tendencies a more concentrate style of being.

What is a measurement? It bridges the worlds between Potentia and our concrete world. Measurement is like open sesame.. as fundamental as Space and Time.

This makes more sense than the superposition representing superpositions of universes in Many Worlds or mere calculational device in Copenhagen.

Heisenberg is the way to go. It's more likely than Many Worlds. If anyone can refute Heisenberg Potentia, please do it now before I got into Potentia mania. My question is. Before measurement, decoherence can influence the particles.. so what does it mean it is located in Potentia? Does this refute Heisenberg Intepretation?

 

[rodsika]

After more time in the internet. I found the original source of Heisenberg material. He published the book Physics and Philisophy in 1958 and the following paragraph in

http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/heisenb3.htm

It is important and may be the source of his views or possible misinterpretation by physicsts like Nick Herbert and Henry Stapp. Therefore let us analyze it completely:

"Now, the theoretical interpretation of an experiment starts with the two steps that have been discussed. In the first step we have to describe the arrangement of the experiment, eventually combined with a first observation, in terms of classical physics and translate this description into a probability function. This probability function follows the laws of quantum theory, and its change in the course of time, which is continuous, can be calculated from the initial conditions; this is the second step. The probability function combines objective and subjective elements. It contains statements about possibilities or better tendencies ('potentia' in Aristotelian philosophy), and these statements are completely objective, they do not depend on any observer; and it contains statements about our knowledge of the system, which of course are subjective in so far as they may be different for different observers. In ideal cases the subjective element in the probability function may be practically negligible as compared with the objective one. The physicists then speak of a 'pure case'."

Now go to this http://fs-morente.filos.ucm.es/docentes/suarez/papers/SHPMP_Quantum propensities_May07.pdf where someone is analyzing it. She said:

"But a close reading of the book reveals a very complex mixture of interpretational elements, only some compatible with what we nowadays would identify as a Copenhagen interpretation. A commitment to reading the quantum probabilities at least in part in terms of Aristotelian potentialities stands out among the elements apparently alien to the Copenhagen view: ‘‘The probability function combines objective and subjective elements... "

The rest in in the quote above.

Now the most important question. Nick Herbert and Henry Stapp emphasized those "Potentia" are really there and not figurative. Pls. analyze unbiasedly. What do you think Heisenberg meant or the context of his statement? Do you think Heisenberg believed they are real or assumed the Potentia were possible?

 

[John Jones]

"Tendency" is a technical gloss on "we don't know, it just happens". God's decisions have been cited in a similar way.

It's lazy and disingenuous to postulate a hidden decision maker, like tendency, when we don't know why something happens. Anything that happens for an unknown reason will be a tendency or probablistic - it's grammar, not quantum theory.

 

[Darken-Sol]

is this why the future exists in wave form while the past is collapsed? experiencing the present being the "measurement" which causes the collapse? this is similar to how i feel time and reality function.