Toys can't play: physical agents in Spekkens' theory
- URL: http://arxiv.org/abs/2207.07445v1
- Date: Fri, 15 Jul 2022 12:49:13 GMT
- Title: Toys can't play: physical agents in Spekkens' theory
- Authors: Ladina Hausmann, Nuriya Nurgalieva, L\'idia del Rio
- Abstract summary: We propose a way to model physical implementations of agents, memories, measurements, conditional actions and information processing.
We find that the actions of toy agents are severely limited.
Unlike quantum theory or box world, in the toy theory there are no inconsistencies when physical agents reason about each other's knowledge.
- Score: 0.0
- License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
- Abstract: Information is physical, and for a physical theory to be universal, it should
model observers as physical systems, with concrete memories where they store
the information acquired through experiments and reasoning. Here we address
these issues in Spekkens' toy theory, a non-contextual epistemically restricted
model that partially mimics the behaviour of quantum mechanics. We propose a
way to model physical implementations of agents, memories, measurements,
conditional actions and information processing. We find that the actions of toy
agents are severely limited: although there are non-orthogonal states in the
theory, there is no way for physical agents to consciously prepare them. Their
memories are also constrained: agents cannot forget in which of two arbitrary
states a system is. Finally, we formalize the process of making inferences
about other agents' experiments and model multi-agent experiments like Wigner's
friend. Unlike quantum theory or box world, in the toy theory there are no
inconsistencies when physical agents reason about each other's knowledge.
Related papers
- Epistemic Horizons From Deterministic Laws: Lessons From a Nomic Toy Theory [0.0]
We show that nomic toy theory has incompatible measurements and the complete state of a physical system cannot be known.
We reconcile this with measurement uncertainty as an aspect of the inseparability of subjects and objects.
This work invites further investigations, such as the one of (full) quantum theory.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2024-06-25T14:23:49Z) - Logic meets Wigner's Friend (and their Friends) [49.1574468325115]
We take a fresh look at Wigner's Friend thought-experiment and some of its more recent variants and extensions.
We discuss various solutions proposed in the literature, focusing on a few questions.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2023-07-04T13:31:56Z) - Towards Visual Foundational Models of Physical Scenes [107.40546386739422]
We describe a first step towards learning general-purpose visual representations of physical scenes using only image prediction as a training criterion.
We first define "physical scene" and show that, even though different agents may maintain different representations of the same scene, the underlying physical scene that can be inferred is unique.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2023-06-06T14:45:44Z) - 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) - Thought experiments in a quantum computer [3.651305911948215]
We introduce a software package that allows users to design and run simulations of thought experiments in quantum theory.
It covers cases where several reasoning agents are modelled as quantum systems, such as Wigner's friend experiment.
Our open-source software is written in a quantum programming language, ProjectQ, and runs on classical or quantum hardware.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2022-09-13T18:01:04Z) - 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) - Observing Interventions: A logic for thinking about experiments [62.997667081978825]
This paper makes a first step towards a logic of learning from experiments.
Crucial for our approach is the idea that the notion of an intervention can be used as a formal expression of a (real or hypothetical) experiment.
For all the proposed logical systems, we provide a sound and complete axiomatization.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2021-11-25T09:26:45Z) - A consolidating review of Spekkens' toy theory [0.0]
Spekkens' toy theory is based off a simple premise: "What if we took a common classical theory and added the uncertainty principle as a postulate?"
We consolidate different approaches to Spekkens' toy theory, including the stabilizer formalism and the generalization to arbitrary dimensions.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2021-05-07T14:10:01Z) - Resource theory of imaginarity: Quantification and state conversion [48.7576911714538]
Resource theory of imaginarity has been introduced, allowing for a systematic study of complex numbers in quantum mechanics and quantum information theory.
We investigate imaginarity quantification, focusing on the geometric imaginarity and the robustness of imaginarity, and apply these tools to the state conversion problem in imaginarity theory.
Our study reveals the significance of complex numbers in quantum physics, and proves that imaginarity is a resource in optical experiments.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2021-03-02T15:30:27Z) - The original Wigner's friend paradox within a realist toy model [0.0]
The original Wigner's friend paradox highlights the tension between unitary evolution and collapse in quantum theory.
We present a classical toy model in which the contradicting predictions at the heart of the thought experiment are reproduced.
The debate surrounding the original Wigner's friend thought experiment and its resolution have striking similarities with arguments concerning the nature of the second law of thermodynamics.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2021-01-26T19:03:32Z) - Operational Resource Theory of Imaginarity [48.7576911714538]
We show that quantum states are easier to create and manipulate if they only have real elements.
As an application, we show that imaginarity plays a crucial role for state discrimination.
arXiv Detail & Related papers (2020-07-29T14:03:38Z)
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.