Mythical Thought in Bohr's Anti-Realist Realism (Or: Lessons on How to Capture and Defeat Smoky Dragons)

• URL: http://arxiv.org/abs/2101.00255v2
• Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2022 20:02:08 GMT
• Title: Mythical Thought in Bohr's Anti-Realist Realism (Or: Lessons on How to Capture and Defeat Smoky Dragons)
• Authors: Christian de Ronde
• Abstract summary: Bohrian approach to quantum mechanics is essentially grounded on an inconsistent form of anti-realist realism. We will discuss the role of smoky dragons within both contemporary physics and philosophy of physics.
• Score: 0.0
• License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
• Abstract: In this work we argue that the power and effectiveness of the Bohrian approach to quantum mechanics is essentially grounded on an inconsistent form of anti-realist realism which supports not only the uncritical tolerance -- in physics -- towards the "standard" account of the theory of quanta but also -- in philosophy -- to the mad reproduction of mythical (inconsistent and vague) narratives -- known as "interpretations". We will discuss the existence of -- what John Archibald Wheeler named -- "smoky dragons" not only within the standard formulation of the theory but also within the many interpretations that have been -- later on -- introduced by philosophers and philosophically inclined physicists. After analyzing the role of smoky dragons within both contemporary physics and philosophy of physics we will propose a general procedure grounded on a series of necessary theoretical conditions for producing meaningful physical concepts that -- hopefully -- could be used as tools and weapons to capture and defeat these beautiful and powerful mythical creatures.

Related papers

• Relaxation of first-class constraints and the quantization of gauge theories: from "matter without matter" to the reappearance of time in quantum gravity [72.27323884094953]
  We make a conceptual overview of an approach to the initial-value problem in canonical gauge theories. We stress how the first-class phase-space constraints may be relaxed if we interpret them as fixing the values of new degrees of freedom.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2024-02-19T19:00:02Z)
• The physics and metaphysics of the conceptuality interpretation of quantum mechanics [0.0]
  It has been argued that the difficulty in understanding quantum theory is our failed attempt to force onto it a wrong conceptual scheme. Many thinkers have suggested that we must surrender to the fact that our physical world is one of immanent powers and potencies. However, if on the one hand a potentiality puts the accent on the processes of change, responsible for the incessant shifts between actual and potential properties, on the other hand it does not tell what these changes are all about.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2023-10-14T10:00:49Z)
• Can we "effectivize'' spacetime? [6.793496936204057]
  According to textiteffective realism, scientific theories give us knowledge about the unobservable world, but not at the fundamental level. This view is justified by the well-received textiteffective-field-theory (EFT) approach to physics. I explain the motivations for the EFT approach and effective realism and their benefits.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2023-09-08T00:59:28Z)
• Bohr's Anti-Realist Realism in Contemporary (Quantum) Physics and Philosophy [0.0]
  We discuss the influential role of Niels Bohr's work in the anti-realist realist re-foundation of physics. We will focus in how, still today, anti-realist realism continues to rule the contemporary post-modern research in both (quantum) physics and philosophy.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2023-06-24T14:09:20Z)
• Intrinsic Physical Concepts Discovery with Object-Centric Predictive Models [86.25460882547581]
  We introduce the PHYsical Concepts Inference NEtwork (PHYCINE), a system that infers physical concepts in different abstract levels without supervision. We show that object representations containing the discovered physical concepts variables could help achieve better performance in causal reasoning tasks.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2023-03-03T11:52:21Z)
• Towards Noncommutative Quantum Reality [0.0]
  The implications of the physical theory of quantum mechanics on the question of realism is much a subject of sustaining interest. We give here a picture of quantum mechanics as the basic theory for nonrelativistic' particle dynamics. The key is to fully embrace the noncommutativity of the theory and see it as a notion about the reality of physical quantities.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2022-02-19T10:27:23Z)
• Quantum realism: axiomatization and quantification [77.34726150561087]
  We build an axiomatization for quantum realism -- a notion of realism compatible with quantum theory. We explicitly construct some classes of entropic quantifiers that are shown to satisfy almost all of the proposed axioms.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2021-10-10T18:08:42Z)
• The operational framework for quantum theories is both epistemologically and ontologically neutral [0.0]
  It is argued that there is no argument that could favour realist or antirealist attitudes towards quantum mechanics based solely on some features of some formalism. Both realist and antirealist views are well accomodable within operational formulations of the theory. This discussion aims at clarifying the limits of the historical and methodological affinities between scientific antirealism and operational physics.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2021-09-06T09:22:43Z)
• Testing quantum theory with thought experiments [4.847980206213335]
  How should one model systems that include agents who are themselves using quantum theory? We give a state-of-the-art overview on quantum thought experiments involving observers.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2021-06-09T18:08:23Z)
• Self-adjointness in Quantum Mechanics: a pedagogical path [77.34726150561087]
  This paper aims to make quantum observables emerge as necessarily self-adjoint, and not merely hermitian operators. Next to the central core of our line of reasoning, the necessity of a non-trivial declaration of a domain to associate with the formal action of an observable.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2020-12-28T21:19:33Z)
• Quantum Theory Needs No 'Interpretation' But 'Theoretical Formal-Conceptual Unity' (Or: Escaping Adan Cabello's "Map of Madness" With the Help of David Deutsch's Explanations) [0.0]
  We argue that there are reasons to believe that the creation of 'interpretations' for the theory of quanta has functioned as a trap designed by anti-realists. We will argue that the key to escape the anti-realist trap of interpretation is to recognize that --as Einstein told Heisenberg almost one century ago-- it is only the theory which can tell you what can be observed.
  arXiv  Detail & Related papers  (2020-08-01T19:10:06Z)

This list is automatically generated from the titles and abstracts of the papers in this site.

This site does not guarantee the quality of this site (including all information) and is not responsible for any consequences.