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Understanding Quantum Physics: An Advanced Guide for the Perplexed
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DescriptionQuantum physics is admittedly the most difficult subject to understand. Physicists, let alone students and laymen, are still puzzled by it today. As Richard Feynman once famously claimed, nobody understood quantum mechanics. The crux of the matter lies in the meaning of the mysterious wave function in the theory. An electron is represented by a wave function. But it remains unclear what physical state the mathematical wave function represents. Exactly what is an electron? Is it a spreading wave or a localized particle? If the electron is still a particle, then how does it move? e.g. how does a single electron pass through two slits?This book will convincingly show that the real meaning of the wave function can already be unveiled based on the established parts of quantum mechanics. It turns out that electrons are still localized particles, but their motion is not continuous but discontinuous and random, displaying wave-like behavior. For example, in the double-slit experiment with single electrons, each electron passes through two slits at the same time in a random and discontinuous way. Moreover, the book also answers another three fundamental questions about quantum mechanics. How come the Schrödinger equation? Does the wave function collapse during a measurement? If yes, then why and how? Is quantum mechanics compatible with special relativity? If not, then how to solve the incompatibility problem? The original ideas of this book, if confirmed, may finally unveil the mysterious quantum world and make quantum physics comprehensible for everyone. Book & Thoughts Reviews This is an ambitious work that reflects admirable grip, and distinctive take, on much of the contemporary philosophy of quantum mechanics literature. ---- Reviewer of Philosophy of Science The idea of using discontinuous motion as a realist interpretation of quantum mechanics is original. ---- Reviewer of Foundations of Physics If it goes through, this would be an original and significant contribution to the debate over the nature of motion. ---- Reviewer of American Philosophical Quarterly Its very existence is at any rate, an excellent illustration of the extent to which physical data force us to depart from commonsense ideas when we try to depict reality “as it really is”. ---- Bernard d'Espagnat, Templeton Prize 2009 Laureate, author of Conceptual Foundations of Quantum Mechanics and On Physics and Philosophy
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