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Published on: May 30, 2014
Quantum ontology without speculation
1Institute of Philosophy, University of Bern, Laenggassstrasse 49, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland.
Abstract:
Existing proposals concerning the ontology of quantum mechanics (QM) either involve speculation that goes beyond the scientific evidence or abandon realism about large parts of QM. This paper proposes a way out of this dilemma, by showing that QM as it is formulated in standard textbooks allows for a much more substantive ontological commitment than is usually acknowledged. For this purpose, I defend a non-fundamentalist approach to ontology, which is then applied to various aspects of QM. In particular, I will defend realism about spin, which has been viewed as a particularly hard case for the ontology of QM.
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