Quantum philosophy: understanding and interpreting contemporary science

321 Pages·1999·1.01 MB·English

by  Roland Omnes

Quantum Philosophy
✣
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Quantum Philosophy
UNDERSTANDING AND INTERPRETING
CONTEMPORARY SCIENCE
✣
OLAND MN S
R O f
Translated by Arturo Sangalli
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY
Copyright1999byPrincetonUniversityPress
PublishedbyPrincetonUniversityPress,41WilliamStreet,
Princeton,NewJersey08540
IntheUnitedKingdom:PrincetonUniversityPress,
Chichester,WestSussex
TranslatedfromtheFrencheditionofRolandOmnès,
Philosophiedelasciencecontemporaine
(Paris:EditionsGallimard,1994)
AllRightsReserved
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Omnès,Roland
[Philosophiedelasciencecontemporaine.English]
Quantumphilosophy:understandingandinterpretingcontemporary
science/RolandOmnès;translatedbyArturoSangalli.
p. cm.
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN0-691-02787-0(cl.:alk.paper)
1.Physics—Philosophy. 2.Mathematics—Philosophy.
3.Science—Philosophy. 4.Quantumtheory.
I.Title.
QC6.055 1999
530′.01—dc21 98-42445
PublishedwiththeassistanceoftheFrenchMinistryofCulture
ThisbookhasbeencomposedinSabon
Thepaperusedinthispublicationmeetstheminimumrequirements
ofANSI/NISOZ39.48-1992(R1997)(PermanenceofPaper)
http://pup.princeton.edu
PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Contents
✣ ✣
Preface xi
Acknowledgments xiii
Prelude xv
PARTONE
THELEGACY 1
CHAPTER I
Classical Logic 6
Pythagoras and thePariah 7
Plato and theLogos 10
The Logic of Aristotle and of Chrysippus 12
The Paradoxes 16
Two Useful Notions 19
The Universals 20
CHAPTER II
Classical Physics 23
Astronomy, from Hipparchus to Kepler 23
The Dawn of Mechanics 28
Newton’s Dynamics 31
Wavesin theEther 36
The Beginning of Electromagnetism 39
A Turning Point: Maxwell’s Equations 41
CHAPTER III
Classical Mathematics 47
Classical Mathematics 47
Rigor and Profusion in theNineteenth Century 53
Mathematicsand Infinity 58
CHAPTER IV
Classical Philosophy of Knowledge 62
Francis Bacon and Experience 62
Descartesand Reason 64
Locke and Empiricism 66
CONTENTS
Digression: Cognition Sciences 67
Hume’sPragmatism 69
Kant 71
PARTTWO
THEFRACTURE 79
CHAPTER V
Formal Mathematics 84
The Ageof Formalism 84
Formal Logic 86
Symbols and Sets 88
Propositions 91
Some Remarks Regarding Truth 93
Taming Infinity 97
Today’s Mathematics 100
The Crisis in theFoundations of Set Theory 102
Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem 105
A TentativeConclusion 107
CHAPTER VI
The Philosophy of Mathematics 108
What Is Mathematics? 108
MathematicalRealism 111
Nominalism 116
MathematicalSociologism 118
Mathematicsand Physical Reality 121
CHAPTER VII
Formal Physics 124
The Century of Formal Physics 124
Relativity 126
The RelativisticTheory of Gravitation 130
The Prehistory of theAtom 134
Classical Physics in a Straitjacket 138
The Assassination of Classical Physics 140
The Harvestof Results 144
CHAPTER VIII
The Epistemology of Physics 147
Why Do We Need Interpretation? 148
vi
CONTENTS
Uncertainties 150
The Principle of Complementarity 152
The Reduction of theWave Function 155
PARTTHREE
FROMFORMALBACKTOVISUAL:
THEQUANTUMCASE 159
CHAPTER IX
BetweenLogic and Physics 163
The Outline of a Program 163
The Logic of Common Sense 165
Classical Dynamics and Determinism 168
With theHelp of an Angel 170
Observables 173
Rudiments of a Quantum Dialect 174
Histories 177
The Role of Probabilities 178
The Logic of theQuantum World 180
Complementarity 181
A Logical Law of Physics 182
CHAPTER X
Rediscovering Common Sense 184
The World on a Large Scale 184
The Logic of Common Sense 186
Determinism 190
A First Philosophical Survey 193
CHAPTER XI
From the Measurable to the Unmeasurable 196
The Poignant Problem of Interferences 196
The DecoherenceEffect 199
The Wonders of Decoherence:Physical 202
The Wonders of Decoherence:Logical 204
Last Wonders: TheDirection of Time 207
MeasurementTheory 208
WaveFunction Reduction Revisited 209
The Chasm 211
Addendum 215
vii
CONTENTS
CHAPTER XII
On Realism 216
A Brief History of Realism 216
Quantum Physics and Realism 221
Ordinary Reality 223
Rationality versus Realism 224
The “EPR” Experiment 225
Bell and Aspect 227
Controversies about Histories 230
Toward a Wider Realism 233
PARTFOUR
STATEOFTHEQUESTIONANDPERSPECTIVES 235
CHAPTER XIII
A New Beginning 237
A Preliminary Report 237
The Beginnings of a Philosophy 239
The Religious Temptationand theSacred 241
CHAPTER XIV
What Is Science? 246
Scienceas Representation 246
On Certain Typesof Laws 248
The Transformations of Science 250
Thomas Kuhn 252
CHAPTER XV
Method 255
A Method for Judging, Not for Building 255
Which Method? 256
A Four-Stage Method 257
The Natureof theFour Stages 260
The Lesson of theFailed Attempts 261
Method and theSocial Sciences 262
Consistency and Beauty 264
The Flexibility of Principles 266
The Thing in theWorld Most Evenly
Distributed 267
viii
CONTENTS
CHAPTER XVI
Vanishing Perspectives 269
The Theory of Knowledge 269
Logos 271
The Instauration 273
Founding Science 278
Glossary 283
NameIndex 291
Subject Index 295
ix