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January 10, 2017

Introduction

With the beginning of the 20th century, a period of unprecedented controversy

on the nature of our reality has begun. The advent of theories operating outside
humanitys classical intuition regions like Quantum Mechanics and Relativity has
risen important question about the determinacy of our world and the redefining of
the classical notions of observerand measurement.
The purpose of this article is to examine an interpretation of the well established
and extensively tested theory of Quantum Mechanics and some of its physical and
philosophical implications. I think it is important to establish, at this point, the
differences between an interpretation and a scientific theory. A scientific theory is a
logical construction(founded on a set of fundamental assumptions called principles )
aimed at explaining certain phenomena occurring in reality. It is usually associated
with a mathematical formalism, which makes it possible to obtain predictions, verifiable through experiment about the properties of the respective phenomena. Thus,
in the context of a theory, an interpretation aims to argue for a set of principles at
the basis of the theory, while respecting the mathematical formalism and the predictions .It is important to note, however, that in any field some interpretations are
more popular than others based on different epistemiological criteria(e.g Occams
Razor).
For Quantum Mechanics, the standard, widely accepted interpretation is the
Copenhagen one, constructed in the 1920s by collective efforts of physicists including
Werner Heisenberg and Niels Bohr. It presumes that unobserved particles have an
associated wavefunction which governs their evolution according to the Schrodinger
equation. However, performing a measurement on a particle will alterits wavefunction by a discontinous process known as Wavefunction collapse. However, in recent
years, an alternate interpretation has gained popularity among the scientific community: The Everett(Many-worlds) interpretation.
The interpretation was formally developed by Hugh Everett III in his PhD. thesis
"The Theory of the Universal Wavefunction" in 1957 and an article summarizing his
ideas was published during the same year. Both were introducing a Relative state
formulation, as Everett named it.
Everetts work was met by acute rejection from the scientific community at that
time. This caused Everett to quit physics research in favor of a workplace in the military simulations domain for the Pentagon and his formulation was mostly ignored
for more than a decade. It was not until the 1970s when Bryce DeWitt, who had
previously corresponded with Everett about his formulation, published the volume
The Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics which contained Everetts
disertation and other related papers. The name "Many-worlds" resonated with
science-fiction enthusiasts and the interpretation infiltrated popular culture fast but,
as it often happens, was misunderstood even faster. Thus, the interpretation gained
spotlight at the cost of infamy due to association with pseudoscientific speculation.
After DeWitts rebaptism of the formulation, more and more physicists started
taking an interest into the interpretation. In present days it is seen as a serious
contender to the Copenhagen interpretation.

The interpretation

The many-world interpretation treats the whole universe as an isolated quantum

system. Thus, all of its components have an associated wavefunction. This assumption eliminates the problematic definitions of notions such as measurement and
observer. Thus, what would classically be considered a measurement corresponds in
the Everett interpretation to an interaction between two components of an isolated
system.
An example is instructive for the understanding of the interpretation. Let us
choose a simple setup:Doug, his classical measurement device and an unspecified
particle form an isolated system . Doug tries to measure an observable A(wich
corresponds to a Hermitian operator A) of a particle i. Doug knows that the possible results of the measurements belong to the set A1 , A2 , .... with corresponding
eigenstates 1 , 2 , ..... Now, we can consider that the system minus particle has
a wavefunction S , existing in a linear combination of states 1 , 2 and that the
particle has a wavefunction p . The eigenstates of the operator A form a complete
orthonormal basis and thus p can be written as:
X
p =
cn n
(1)
Now, Everett proposes that S combines with the different eigenstates of p
such that the entire system now is in a superposition of Dougi < > Ai entangled
pairs where Dougi corresponds to a state where Doug has recorded a value Ai for
the observable A. It works as an extension of the superposition of different states for
a particle in the absence of measurement in the Copenhagen Interpretation. Thus,
in the Many-Worlds interpretation all the outcomes of a measurement happen but
states corresponding to different outcomes evolve separately from each other.
The nature of the states involved in the superposition has been a subject of criticism for the interpretation for a long period of time. The criticism revolves around
the Preferred Basis Problem: why do we not observe states which are linear combinations of the pure Dougi < > Ai . It turns out this is due to the phenomena of
quantum decoherence:Each state has an associated wavefunction and interaction between states is equivalent to interference. Interference requires coherence, a constant
phase difference between the two "waveforms". However, after the formation of the
pairs the two states are distorted by the influence of the surrounding media. Thus,
the waveforms lose coherence almost instantaneously after the "measurement" and
interaction between them becomes impossible.
The greatest merit of the Many-World interpretation is that it eliminates the
need for the wavefunction collapse postulate in the Copenhagen Interpretation. The
latter implied an inherent randomness of the universe, a property which poses a
multitude of ontological problems.Thus, judging by the number of postulates needed
to set up the formulation, Everetts is more preferable if judged through the criterion
of Occams razor.
It is important to note that this formulation of quantum mechanics implies an
intriguing idea: Our concept of probability is an illusion rooted in ignorance. As we
cannot perceive the different states, we fill in the gaps in our knowledge with such
concepts.
As an interpretation needs to account for all the results of the theory, a way
to justify the Born rule was needed for the completeness of the formulation. The
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first difficulty in solving this problem appears in the form of finding an appropriate
correspondent to the notion of probability. One idea, pioneered by Lev Vaidman[ 12]
Different mathematical arguments have been made into proving this, but no officially
accepted solution has been found.