quantum mechanics
Quantum Mechanics’ Epistemic turn: from Objective reality to Knowledge documentary
This physics documentary explores the history of physics, focusing on the deep questions of epistemology and the philosophy of science. We examine the great debate between Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr over the Copenhagen Interpretation, diving into concepts like anti-realism and the conflict between subjectivity vs objectivity.
We’ll unpack quantum paradoxes like Schrödinger’s Cat and Wigner’s Friend, and investigate proposed solutions from logical positivism to modern theories like QBism, which uses Bayesian inference, and the Relational QM of Carlo Rovelli. Our journey covers John Wheeler’s ‘It from Bit,’ the rise of quantum computing and information theory, and even challenges to realism like Bohmian mechanics with its pilot wave and hidden variables, or the Many-Worlds interpretation. We’ll even explore how emergent spacetime might arise from quantum entanglement and trace the philosophical lineage of these ideas back to Emmanuel Kant.
SOURCES
Becker, A. (2018). What Is Real?: The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of Quantum Physics. Basic Books.
Bohm, D. (1952). A Suggested Interpretation of the Quantum Theory in Terms of « Hidden » Variables. Physical Review, 85(2).
Fuchs, C. A., Mermin, N. D., & Schack, R. (2014). An Introduction to QBism with an Application to the Locality of Quantum Mechanics. American Journal of Physics, 82(8).
Rovelli, C. (2021). Helgoland: Making Sense of the Quantum Revolution. Riverhead Books.
Von Neumann, J. (1955). Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics. Princeton University Press.
Wheeler, J. A. (1990). Information, physics, quantum: The search for links. In W. Zurek (Ed.), Complexity, Entropy, and the Physics of Information. Addison-Wesley.
Quantum Mechanics
Quantum mechanics (QM — also known as quantum physics, or quantum theory) is a branch of physics which deals with physical phenomena at nanoscopic scales where the action is on the order of the Planck constant. It departs from classical mechanics primarily at the quantum realm of atomic and subatomic length scales. Quantum mechanics provides a mathematical description of much of the dual particle-like and wave-like behavior and interactions of energy and matter. Quantum mechanics provides a substantially useful framework for many features of the modern periodic table of elements including the behavior of atoms during chemical bonding and has played a significant role in the development of many modern technologies.
The earliest versions of quantum mechanics were formulated in the first decade of the 20th century. About this time, the atomic theory and the corpuscular theory of light (as updated by Einstein)[1] first came to be widely accepted as scientific fact; these latter theories can be viewed as quantum theories of matter and electromagnetic radiation, respectively. Early quantum theory was significantly reformulated in the mid-1920s by Werner Heisenberg, Max Born and Pascual Jordan, (matrix mechanics); Louis de Broglie and Erwin Schrödinger (wave mechanics); and Wolfgang Pauli and Satyendra Nath Bose (statistics of subatomic particles). Moreover, the Copenhagen interpretation of Niels Bohr became widely accepted. By 1930, quantum mechanics had been further unified and formalized by the work of David Hilbert, Paul Dirac and John von Neumann[2] with a greater emphasis placed on measurement in quantum mechanics, the statistical nature of our knowledge of reality, and philosophical speculation about the role of the observer. Quantum mechanics has since permeated throughout many aspects of 20th-century physics and other disciplines including quantum chemistry, quantum electronics, quantum optics, and quantum information science. Much 19th-century physics has been re-evaluated as the « classical limit » of quantum mechanics and its more advanced developments in terms of quantum field theory, string theory, and speculative quantum gravity theories.
TANIKO Madagascar 