The Logic of Quanta Are there quantum objects? What are they if they are neither given nor resemble anything familiar? To answer these questions we have to abstract from the substantive features of familiar things, delineate the pure lo Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
INDISTINGUISHABILITY AND INDIVIDUALITY
INDISTINGUISHABILITY AND INDIVIDUALITY We shall begin by recalling the argument that leads to the conclusion that quantum particles are non-individuals, in some yet to be worked out sense. The connection between the above philosophical Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
TRANS-TEMPORAL IDENTITY
TRANS-TEMPORAL IDENTITY This concerns the problem of re-identification through time; that is, of supplying the grounds on which an individual b at time t 2 can be identified as the same individual a at an earlier time t 1 . A necessary Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
THE INDIVIDUALITY OF QUANTUM PARTICLES
THE INDIVIDUALITY OF QUANTUM PARTICLES As we have suggested, this option also has the obvious advantage of allowing us to retain a classical ontology, at least where it concerns the individuals themselves. Perhaps that is its only advan Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
Individuality and Non-Individuality in Quantum Mechanics
Individuality and Non-Individuality in Quantum Mechanics You cannot mark an electron, you cannot paint it red. Indeed, you must not even think of it as marked. E. Schrödinger 1953 Let us recall our discussion from Chapter Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
A BRIEF HISTORY OF CLASSICAL STATISTICAL MECHANICS
A BRIEF HISTORY OF CLASSICAL STATISTICAL MECHANICS The kinetic theory of matter attempts to explain the empirical regularities occurring in the macroscopic properties of material objects in terms of the microscopic behaviour of their at Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
BACK TO THE HISTORY: PARASTATISTICS
BACK TO THE HISTORY: PARASTATISTICS As we have indicated, as early as 1926 Dirac realized that the symmetric and anti-symmetric functions were merely the two simplest out of the set of possible eigenfunctions for the assembly. Thus he l Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
‘BUNDLE’ INDIVIDUALITY
‘BUNDLE’ INDIVIDUALITY ‘Principles’ of individuality that involve sets or ‘bundles’ of properties or attributes must face the problem of multiple instantiability which can be expressed in the further question: what is it that guarantees Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
TRANSCENDENTAL INDIVIDUALITY
TRANSCENDENTAL INDIVIDUALITY Principles of individuality which invoke something over and above some set of properties of an entity are examples of what Post has called ‘Transcendental Individuality’ (TI). 24 As originally introduced, t Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
QUASETS
QUASETS The central idea of quaset theory is that an assembly of quantum particles—electrons in an atom, say—has a cardinal but not an ordinal. 103 If we consider a helium atom, for example, we can conclude that there are two electrons Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
A Problem for Present-Day Mathematics
A Problem for Present-Day Mathematics Steven French Décio Krause The development of the foundations of physics in the twentieth century has taught us a serious lesson. Creating and understanding these foundations turned out to ha Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
BOHR S VIEW OF PARTICLE INDIVIDUALITY
BOHR S VIEW OF PARTICLE INDIVIDUALITY Bohr first mentioned his doctrine of ‘complementarity’ in an early draft of his famous talk at Como in September 1927. 100 It has become common to understand this doctrine more or less straightforw Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
THE EARLY HISTORY OF QUANTUM STATISTICS
THE EARLY HISTORY OF QUANTUM STATISTICS Determining the origins of a revolution is always a tricky business. Most commentators take Planck s famous paper of 1900 1 as marking the birth of quantum theory, although Dorling, in his present Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
THE IMPACT OF QUANTUM STATISTICS: QUANTUM NON-INDIVIDUALITY
THE IMPACT OF QUANTUM STATISTICS: QUANTUM NON-INDIVIDUALITY As we have seen, it was perceived quite early in the history of quantum mechanics that quantum statistics raised a number of fundamental issues regarding the nature of the quan Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
THE LATER HISTORY OF QUANTUM STATISTICS
THE LATER HISTORY OF QUANTUM STATISTICS From about 1910 onwards attention shifted increasingly towards the problems of atomic structure and other questions, but the publication of Bose s work in 1924, and the subsequent elaboration of i Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
THE ROLE OF NAMES IN SCIENCE
THE ROLE OF NAMES IN SCIENCE The function of names, at least, appears straightforward: it is to refer to an individual. When we assert that ‘Max Planck was the first to quantize energy’, we are using the name ‘Max Planck’ to refer to a spe Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
The Mathematics of Non-Individuality
The Mathematics of Non-Individuality Steven French Décio Krause If mathematical thinking is defective, where are we to find truth and certitude? D. Hilbert, On the Infinite, 1925 As we saw in Chapter 5, Dalla Chiara and To Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
A FIELD-THEORETIC APPROACH
A FIELD-THEORETIC APPROACH As well as particle theories such as statistical mechanics, classical physics also encompasses field theories such as electrodynamics. The distinction between the two kinds of theory is most obvious when one c Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
SPACE-TIME INDIVIDUALITY AND CONFIGURATION SPACE
SPACE-TIME INDIVIDUALITY AND CONFIGURATION SPACE We have seen that individuating the particles in terms of their properties in general is problematic. The classical alternative of both individuating and distinguishing them in terms of s Citeste tot ...
Dimensiune
SCHRÖDINGER AND THE LOSS OF IDENTITY
SCHRÖDINGER AND THE LOSS OF IDENTITY The most well-known articulation of the Received View can be—and typically has been—attributed to Schrödinger. We have already noted his concern with particle identifiability and individuality in his Citeste tot ...