Four strategies for dealing with the counting anomaly in spontaneous collapse theories of quantum mechanics

International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 17 (2):137 – 142 (2003)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

A few years ago, I argued that according to spontaneous collapse theories of quantum mechanics, arithmetic applies to macroscopic objects only as an approximation. Several authors have written articles defending spontaneous collapse theories against this charge, including Bassi and Ghirardi, Clifton and Monton, and now Frigg. The arguments of these authors are all different and all ingenious, but in the end I think that none of them succeeds, for reasons I elaborate here. I suggest a fourth line of response, based on an analogy with epistemic paradoxes, which I think is the best way to defend spontaneous collapse theories, and which leaves my main thesis intact.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 77,916

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Interpreting spontaneous collapse theories.Peter J. Lewis - 2004 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 36 (1):165-180.
Quantum mechanics and ordinary language: The fuzzy link.Peter J. Lewis - 2003 - Philosophy of Science 70 (5):1437-1446.
Quantum states for primitive ontologists: A case study.Gordon Belot - 2012 - European Journal for Philosophy of Science 2 (1):67-83.

Analytics

Added to PP
2009-01-28

Downloads
86 (#147,915)

6 months
1 (#485,121)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Peter J. Lewis
Dartmouth College

Citations of this work

Collapse theories.Giancarlo Ghirardi - 2008 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
The problem of ontology for spontaneous collapse theories.Bradley Monton - 2004 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 35 (3):407-421.
Non-accessible mass and the ontology of GRW.Cristian Mariani - 2022 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 91 (C):270-279.
GRW: A case study in quantum ontology.Peter J. Lewis - 2006 - Philosophy Compass 1 (2):224–244.

View all 9 citations / Add more citations

References found in this work

Quantum mechanics, orthogonality, and counting.Peter J. Lewis - 1997 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 48 (3):313-328.
Losing Your Marbles in Wavefunction Collapse Theories.Rob Clifton & Bradley Monton - 1999 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 50 (4):697 - 717.
Counting marbles: Reply to Clifton and Monton.Angelo Bassi & GianCarlo Ghirardi - 2001 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 52 (1):125-130.
More about Dynamical Reduction and the Enumeration Principle.Angelo Bassi & GianCarlo Ghirardi - 1999 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 50 (4):719-734.

View all 11 references / Add more references