The overwhelming majority of scientists still takes it for granted that classical mechanics (ClM) is nothing but a limiting case of quantum mechanics (QM). Although some physicists restrict this belief to a generalized QM as represented, e. g., by the algebra of observables, it will be shown in this contribution that the view of ClM as a mere sub-set of QM is nevertheless unfounded. The usual attempts to derive the laws of ClM from QM are either insufficient or not universally applicable. The transition from traditional to algebraic QM does not add any further insight. It is demonstrated that typical constituents of the classical macroscopic world i) cannot be described reasonably in terms of QM and/or ii) do not show up the typical quantum behavior which manifests in the double-slit interference and in the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen correlations. Moreover, both attempts to recover ClM from QM and approaches based on vacuum fluctuations are critically inspected, and we arrive at the conclusion: QM does not comprehend ClM, i. e., a wavefunction of the universe does not exist.
The most puzzling issue in the foundations of quantum mechanics is perhaps that of the status of the wave function of a system in a quantum universe. Is the wave function objective or subjective? Does it represent the physical state of the system or merely our information about the system? And if the former, does it provide a complete description of the system or only a partial description? We shall address these questions here mainly from a Bohmian perspective, and shall argue that part of the difficulty in ascertaining the status of the wave function in quantum mechanics arises from the fact…
In this paper, we study the physical meaning of the wavefunction of the universe. With the continuity equation derived from the Wheeler-DeWitt (WDW) equation in the minisuperspace model, we show that the quantity $ρ(a)=|ψ(a)|^2$ for the universe is inversely proportional to the Hubble parameter of the universe. Thus, $ρ(a)$ represents the probability density of the universe staying in the state $a$ during its evolution, which we call the dynamical interpretation of the wavefunction of the universe. We demonstrate that the dynamical interpretation can predict the evolution laws of the universe …
Two thought experiments are analyzed, revealing that the quantum state of the universe does not contain definitive evidence of the wavefunction collapse. The first thought experiment shows that unitary quantum evolution alone can account for the outcomes of any combination of quantum experiments. This is in contradiction with the standard view on quantum measurement, which appeals to the wavefunction collapse, but it is in full agreement with the special state proposal (L.S. Schulman in Phys Lett A 102(9):396-400, 1984; J Stat Phys 42(3):689-719 1986; Time's arrows and quantum measurement, Cam…
Is there a single linearly evolving Wave Function of the Universe that is able to lead to all the nonlinearities we see around us? This proposal seems a priori highly implausible. I claim that instead, in the real Universe, generically only local wave functions exist. Non-local wave functions occur for carefully engineered contexts such as Bell experiments, but there is no single wave function for a cat or similar macroscopic objects such as a brain. Contextual wave function collapse leads to a defensible version of the Copenhagen interpretation, where classical macro levels provide the contex…
A closed vacuum-dominated Friedmann universe is asymptotic to a de Sitter space with a cosmological event horizon for any observer. The holographic principle says the area of the horizon in Planck units determines the number of bits of information about the universe that will ever be available to any observer. The wavefunction describing the probability distribution of mass quanta associated with bits of information on the horizon is the boundary condition for the wavefunction specifying the probability distribution of mass quanta throughout the universe. Local interactions between mass quanta…
We show using a realistic Hamiltonian-type model that definite outcomes of quantum measurements may emerge from quantum evolution of pure states, i.e quantum dynamics provides a deterministic collapse of the wavefunction in a quantum measurement process. The relaxation of the wavefunction into a pointer state with classical properties is driven by the interaction with an environment. The destruction of superpositions, i.e. choosing a preferred attraction basin and thereby a preferred pointer state, is caused by a tiny nonlinearity in the macroscopic measurement apparatus. In more details, we n…
At first sight, an accurate description of the state of the universe appears to require a mind-bogglingly large and perhaps even infinite amount of information, even if we restrict our attention to a small subsystem such as a rabbit. In this paper, it is suggested that most of this information is merely apparent, as seen from our subjective viewpoints, and that the algorithmic information content of the universe as a whole is close to zero. It is argued that if the Schrödinger equation is universally valid, then decoherence together with the standard chaotic behavior of certain non-linear syst…
Four problematic circumstances are considered, involving models which describe dynamical wavefunction collapse toward energy eigenstates, for which it is shown that wavefunction collapse of macroscopic objects does not work properly. In one case, a common particle position measuring situation, the apparatus evolves to a superposition of macroscopically distinguishable states (does not collapse to one of them as it should) because each such particle/apparatus/environment state has precisely the same energy spectrum. Second, assuming an experiment takes place involving collapse to one of two pos…
Modern advances in transformation optics and electromagnetic metamaterials made possible experimental demonstrations of highly unusual curvilinear optical spaces, such as various geometries necessary for electromagnetic cloaking. Recently we demonstrated that mapping light intensity in a hyperbolic metamaterial may also model the flow of time in an effective (2+1) dimensional Minkowski spacetime. Curving such an effective spacetime creates experimental model of a toy big bang. Here we demonstrate that at low light levels this model may be used to emulate a fully covariant version of quantum me…
If the initial quantum state of the universe is a multiverse superposition over many different sets of values of the effective coupling "constants" of physics, and if this quantum state collapses to an eigenstate of the set of coupling "constants" with a probability purely proportional to the absolute square of the amplitude (with no additional factor for something like life or consciousness), then one should not expect that the coupling `constants' would be so biophilic as they are observed to be. Therefore, the observed biophilic values (apparent fine tuning) of the coupling "constants" is s…
We employ Riesz's fractional derivative into the Wheeler--DeWitt equation for a closed de Sitter geometry and obtain the no-boundary and tunneling wavefunctions. From the corresponding probability distributions, the event horizon of the nucleated universe can be a fractal surface with dimensions between $2\leq D<3$. Concretely, the tunneling wavefunction favors fractal dimensions less than $2.5$ and an accelerated power-law phase. Differently, the no-boundary proposal conveys fractal dimensions close to $3$, with the universe instead entering a decelerated phase. Subsequently, we extend our di…
This paper posits that the cosmic digital code as the law of all physical laws contains two mutually exclusive values: attachment space attaching to object and detachment space detaching from object. However, the cosmic physical system could not start with mutually exclusive attachment space and detachment space at the same time in the beginning. The way out of this impasse is that the complete cosmic system consists of both the cosmic physical system and the unphysical cosmic digital code. The unphysical cosmic digital code allows the coexistence of attachment space and detachment space at th…
We argue that the preferred classical variables that emerge from a pure quantum state are determined by its entanglement structure in the form of redundant records: information shared between many subsystems. Focusing on the early universe, we ask how classical metric perturbations emerge from vacuum fluctuations in an inflationary background. We show that the squeezing of the quantum state for super-horizon modes, along with minimal gravitational interactions, leads to decoherence and to an exponential number of records of metric fluctuations on very large scales, $λ/λ_{\rm Hubble}>Δ_ζ^{-2/3}…
Quantum mechanics is an outstandingly successful description of nature, underpinning fields from biology through chemistry to physics. At its heart is the quantum wavefunction, the central tool for describing quantum systems. Yet it is still unclear what the wavefunction actually is: does it merely represent our limited knowledge of a system, or is it an element of reality? Recent no-go theorems argued that if there was any underlying reality to start with, the wavefunction must be real. However, that conclusion relied on debatable assumptions, without which a partial knowledge interpretation …
Quantum mechanics is interpreted by the adjacent vacuum that behaves as a virtual particle to be absorbed and emitted by its matter. As described in the vacuum universe model, the adjacent vacuum is derived from the pre-inflationary universe in which the pre-adjacent vacuum is absorbed by the pre-matter. This absorbed pre-adjacent vacuum is emitted to become the added space for the inflation in the inflationary universe whose space-time is separated from the pre-inflationary universe. This added space is the adjacent vacuum. The absorption of the adjacent vacuum as the added space results in t…
An emergent theory of quantum measurement arises directly by considering the particular subset of many body wavefunctions that can be associated with classical condensed matter and its interaction with delocalized wavefunctions. This transfers questions of the "strangeness" of quantum mechanics from the wavefunction to the macroscopic material itself. An effectively many-worlds picture of measurement results for long times and induces a natural arrow of time. The challenging part is then justifying why our macroscopic world is dominated by such far-from-eigenstate matter. Condensing cold mesos…
Internal global symmetries exist for the free non-relativistic Schrödinger particle, whose associated Noether charges--the space integrals of the wavefunction and the wavefunction multiplied by the spatial coordinate--are exhibited. Analogous symmetries in classical electromagnetism are also demonstrated.
Trial states describing anyonic quasiholes in the Laughlin state were found early on, and it is therefore natural to expect that one should also be able to create anyonic quasielectrons. Nevertheless, the existing trial wavefunctions for quasielectrons show behaviors that are not compatible with the expected topological properties or their construction involves ad hoc elements. It was shown, however, that for lattice fractional quantum Hall systems, it is possible to find a relatively simple quasielectron wavefunction that has all the expected properties [New J. Phys. 20, 033029 (2018)]. This …
We study the quantum measurement problem in the context of an infinite, statistically uniform space, as could be generated by eternal inflation. It has recently been argued that when identical copies of a quantum measurement system exist, the standard projection operators and Born rule method for calculating probabilities must be supplemented by estimates of relative frequencies of observers. We argue that an infinite space actually renders the Born rule redundant, by physically realizing all outcomes of a quantum measurement in different regions, with relative frequencies given by the square …
According to Penrose, the fundamental conflict between the superposition principle of quantum mechanics and the principle of general covariance of general relativity entails the existence of wavefunction collapse, e.g. a quantum superposition of two different space-time geometries will collapse to one of them due to the ill-definedness of the time-translation operator for the superposition. In this paper, we argue that Penrose's conjecture on gravity's role in wavefunction collapse is debatable. First of all, it is still a controversial issue what the exact nature of the conflict is and how to…
Based on a number of experimentally verified physical observations, it is argued that the standard principles of quantum mechanics should be applied to the Universe as a whole. Thus, a paradigm is proposed in which the entire Universe is represented by a pure state wavefunction contained in a factorisable Hilbert space of enormous dimension, and where this statevector is developed by successive applications of operators that correspond to unitary rotations and Hermitian tests. Moreover, because by definition the Universe contains everything, it is argued that these operators must be chosen sel…
