Would this experiment disprove Bohmian mechanics?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion centers around the potential to test Bohmian mechanics through a proposed variation of the double slit experiment. Participants explore whether randomness in quantum mechanics can be attributed to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle and how the experiment could provide insights into the validity of Bohmian mechanics.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Technical explanation

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants propose an experiment that involves detecting the position and momentum of particles before they pass through a double slit, suggesting this could challenge the claims of Bohmian mechanics regarding randomness and determinism.
  • One participant raises a concern that detecting a particle's position may interfere with its motion, questioning the feasibility of the proposed detection method.
  • Another participant suggests using magnets to detect the particle's position without stopping it, indicating a possible solution to the detection issue.
  • Some participants argue that Bohm's interpretation of quantum mechanics is more nuanced than simply being deterministic and that his later writings do not link the uncertainty principle to randomness in quantum mechanics.
  • Others assert that Bohmian mechanics posits that particles have definite positions, which are not measurable, and that this is distinct from the uncertainty principle, which is a fundamental aspect of quantum mechanics.
  • There is a contention that Bohmian mechanics and other interpretations of quantum mechanics make the same predictions in experiments, suggesting that distinguishing between them experimentally may not be possible.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express differing views on the interpretation of Bohmian mechanics and the implications of the uncertainty principle. There is no consensus on whether the proposed experiment would effectively challenge Bohmian mechanics or if it is conceptually sound.

Contextual Notes

Some limitations in the discussion include the assumptions about the nature of particle detection and the implications of the uncertainty principle versus the postulates of Bohmian mechanics. The discussion also reflects varying interpretations of Bohm's writings over time.

  • #151
Again, I need only to point to this nice website:

https://www.mathpages.com/rr/s2-04/2-04.htm

Note that here to author works explicitly " frame of reference in which the medium of signal propagation is assumed to be at rest", when he treats the acoustic Doppler effect (sound waves) relativistically. It should be easy to derive the more general formula in an arbitrary frame of reference, where also the medium moves.

It is shown clearly that in the case for em. waves in a vacuum (optical Doppler effect), where the phase speed of the waves goes to the speed of light, the Doppler formula correctly depends only on the relative velocity of the source and the observer (which the author calls absorber) as it must be since there is no aether (within relativistic theory).
 
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  • #152
vanhees71 said:
Again, I need only to point to this nice website:

https://www.mathpages.com/rr/s2-04/2-04.htm

Note that here to author works explicitly " frame of reference in which the medium of signal propagation is assumed to be at rest", when he treats the acoustic Doppler effect (sound waves) relativistically. It should be easy to derive the more general formula in an arbitrary frame of reference, where also the medium moves.

It is shown clearly that in the case for em. waves in a vacuum (optical Doppler effect), where the phase speed of the waves goes to the speed of light, the Doppler formula correctly depends only on the relative velocity of the source and the observer (which the author calls absorber) as it must be since there is no aether (within relativistic theory).

Who or what is that in response to? (It would be nice for you to give some context, such as quoting the relevant lines that you're responding to, or at least name the person you're responding to).
 
  • #153
vanhees71 said:
Well, the regularization you use is irrelevant for this debate, as long as you get a Poincare invariant continuum limit.

But we don't know how to take the lattice spacing to zero, so there is no known UV continuum limit. This is the reason that the standard model is said to be an effective theorie.
 
  • #154
stevendaryl said:
Who or what is that in response to? (It would be nice for you to give some context, such as quoting the relevant lines that you're responding to, or at least name the person you're responding to).
It was in response to your posting #150.
 
  • #155
vanhees71 said:
It was in response to your posting #150.

Well, I don't see how it related to what I said.
 
  • #156
Well, I wanted to give you a clear derivation for the Doppler effect for sound, where of course time dilation is included as it must. Maybe I misunderstood your posting.
 
  • #157
vanhees71 said:
Well, I wanted to give you a clear derivation for the Doppler effect for sound, where of course time dilation is included as it must. Maybe I misunderstood your posting.

Well, let me make it clearer. Let's NOT assume Einstein's relativity. We assume the following:

There is a reference frame (called the "stationary frame") in which
  1. A signal travels at speed ##c##, which is a constant independent of the motion of the source.
  2. A clock moving at speed ##v## will run slower by a factor of ##R## relative to a clock at "rest". (##R > 1## means the moving clock is running slower)
We'll do the derivation with ##R## as an unknown parameter.

We have two observers, one at rest relative to the medium, and one moving at speed ##v## relative to the medium, away from the stationary observer. Assume that each sends a signal toward the other at the rate of once every ##T## seconds, according to his own clock. Then:
  • The signals from the stationary observer are sent out every ##T## seconds.
  • The signals from the stationary observer will arrive once every ##\Delta T = (\frac{c}{c-v}) T## seconds.
  • Because the moving clock is moving slow by a factor of ##R##, the moving observer will measure a smaller time between signals: ##\Delta T' = (\frac{c}{c-v})T/R##
  • The signals from the moving observer are sent out every ##R T## seconds.
  • The signals will arrive every ##\Delta T = (1+\frac{v}{c}) RT## seconds.
Galilean Doppler shift is obtained by choosing ##R=1##, in which case, there is an asymmetry between the rate at which the signals are received by the moving observer, ##\Delta T = (\frac{c}{c-v}) T## and the rate at which signals are received by the stationary observer, ##\Delta T = (1+\frac{v}{c}) T##.

On the other hand, if you choose ##R = \frac{1}{\sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}}}##, then
  • The rate at which the moving observer receives signals is ##\Delta T' = (\frac{c}{c-v})T \sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}} = \sqrt{\frac{1+\frac{v}{c}}{1-\frac{v}{c}}}##
  • The rate at which the stationary observer receives signals is ##\Delta T = (1+\frac{v}{c}) T \frac{1}{\sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}}} = \sqrt{\frac{1+\frac{v}{c}}{1-\frac{v}{c}}}##
So that's the sense in which the relativistic Doppler is a combination of the nonrelativistic Doppler plus time dilation with ##R = \frac{1}{\sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}}}##
 
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  • #158
What you nicely derive is the Doppler effect for light propagation in a vacuum and the Lorentz factor. The question, however was about the Doppler effect of sound in relativity theory, and that's nicely answered at the webpage I quoted (for the special case of the reference frame where the medium is at rest).

It also becomes clear, in which sense there's no "aether", i.e., no medium needed for light as air is a medium for sound waves.
 
  • #159
vanhees71 said:
What you nicely derive is the Doppler effect for light propagation in a vacuum and the Lorentz factor. The question, however was about the Doppler effect of sound in relativity theory, and that's nicely answered at the webpage I quoted (for the special case of the reference frame where the medium is at rest).

Okay, but the issue that I thought was under discussion was to what extent a nonrelativistic theory plus a medium can mimick relativity.
 
  • #160
vanhees71 said:
What you nicely derive is the Doppler effect for light propagation in a vacuum and the Lorentz factor. The question, however was about the Doppler effect of sound in relativity theory, and that's nicely answered at the webpage I quoted (for the special case of the reference frame where the medium is at rest).

It also becomes clear, in which sense there's no "aether", i.e., no medium needed for light as air is a medium for sound waves.
Ah, now I get your point. I agree that, to explain currently existing experiments, no medium for light is needed. But it doesn't imply that no medium is possible.

To explain it, let me first define two new words: quasi-relativity and quasi-Lorentz invariance. By those I mean a theory mathematically looking exactly like standard relativity and standard Lorentz invariance, except that the speed of light ##c## is replaced with the speed of sound ##c_s##.

Now with this language it's easy to explain why sound Doppler effect and light Doppler effect are described by different equations. In the light Doppler effect, not only the wave but also the emitter and detector obey relativistic laws. In the sound Doppler effect, only the wave obeys quasi-relativistic laws (due to the quasi-Lorentz invariant dispersion relation ##\omega=c_s|{\bf k}|##), while the detector and emitter don't.

It is conceivable that in some beyond-the-standard-model theory one has an additional term in action in which a new kind of matter interacts with light and violates Lorentz invariance. An emission and detection of light by such kind of matter could give a formula for Doppler effect that doesn't look like standard Doppler formula for light. Depending on the details of the theory, it could look more like formula for the sound Doppler effect.
 
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