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A Lenient Causal Arrow of Time?
1Department of Physics, Nuclear Research Center-Negev, P.O. Box 9001, Be'er Sheva 84190, Israel.
Entropy (Basel, Switzerland)
|December 3, 2020
Summary
Retrocausal toy-models reproduce quantum mechanics predictions for Bell-type correlations. Superdeterminism is unnecessary, suggesting a more lenient arrow of time for quantum mechanics reformulation.
Area of Science:
- Foundations of quantum mechanics
- Causality and time in physics
Background:
- Bell's theorem relies on the causal arrow of time, yet causality assumptions are understudied compared to locality.
- Quantum mechanics exhibits perplexing features that may be better understood through alternative causal frameworks.
Purpose of the Study:
- To review retrocausal toy-models that replicate Bell-type correlations.
- To analyze the relationship between superdeterminism and retrocausality.
- To propose a reformulation of quantum mechanics with a modified arrow of time.
Main Methods:
- Review of existing retrocausal toy-models.
- Analysis of a superdeterministic toy-model to reveal its retrocausal nature.
- Conceptual exploration of a reformulated quantum mechanics.
Main Results:
- Retrocausal toy-models successfully reproduce quantum mechanical predictions for Bell-type correlations.
- A seemingly superdeterministic model was shown to contain a complete retrocausal model.
- Occam's razor favors retrocausal explanations over superdeterminism.
Conclusions:
- Superdeterminism is a superfluous concept when retrocausal models are considered.
- A reformulation of quantum mechanics with a lenient arrow of time (macroscopically available information) is a promising research direction.
- Such a reformulation could naturally explain puzzling quantum phenomena within stochastic theories.
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