We construct, for any finite dimension $n$, a new hidden measurement model for quantum mechanics based on representing quantum transition probabilities by the volume of regions in projective Hilbert space. For $n=2$ our model is equivalent to the Aerts sphere model and serves as a generalization of it for dimensions $n \geq 3$. We also show how to construct a hidden variables scheme based on hidden measurements and we discuss how joint distributions arise in our hidden variables scheme and their relationship with the results of Fine.
Despite claims that Bell's inequalities are based on the Einstein locality condition, or equivalent, all derivations make an identical mathematical assumption: that local hidden-variable theories produce a set of positive-definite probabilities for detecting a particle with a given spin orientation. The standard argument is that because quantum mechanics assumes that particles are emitted in a superposition of states the theory cannot produce such a set of probabilities. We examine a paper by Eberhard, and several similar papers, which claim to show that a generalized Bell inequality, the CHSH…
It is proved that in non-relativistic quantum mechanics (without spin) the transition probability may be described in terms of particle paths, every path having a (positive) probability. This leads to a stochastic hidden variables theory providing an intuitive picture of particle motion. The change of velocity at every time has a probability that depends on the potential over a large region, at a difference with the local action of classical dynamics. Thus the hidden variables theory is non-local like Bohm's, but not deterministic.
Since the analysis by John Bell in 1965, the consensus in the literature is that von Neumann's 'no hidden variables' proof fails to exclude any significant class of hidden variables. Bell raised the question whether it could be shown that any hidden variable theory would have to be nonlocal, and in this sense 'like Bohm's theory.' His seminal result provides a positive answer to the question. I argue that Bell's analysis misconstrues von Neumann's argument. What von Neumann proved was the impossibility of recovering the quantum probabilities from a hidden variable theory of dispersion free (de…
Negative probabilities have long been discussed in connection with the foundations of quantum mechanics. We have recently shown that, if signed measures are allowed on the hidden variables, the class of probability models which can be captured by local hidden-variable models are exactly the no-signalling models. However, the question remains of how negative probabilities are to be interpreted. In this paper, we present an operational interpretation of negative probabilities as arising from standard probabilities on signed events. This leads, by virtue of our previous result, to a systematic sc…
I review the relation of the Bell inequalities - characteristic of (classical) probabilities defined on Boolean logics - with noncontextual and local hidden variables theories of quantum mechanics and with quantum information.
Colbeck and Renner [arXiv:0801.2218] analyzed a class of combined models for entanglements in which local and non-local hidden variables cooperate for producing the measurement results. They came to the conclusion that the measurement results are fully independent of the local components of the hidden variables. Their conclusion is based mainly on an assumption on the local hidden variables, assumption similar to the non-signaling property of probabilities of observables' values. In the present text it is proved that hidden variables are not observables, so their distributions of probabilities…
We develop an approach where the quantum system states and quantum observables are described as in classical statistical mechanics -- the states are identified with probability distributions and observables, with random variables. An example of the spin-1/2 state is considered. We show that the triada of Malevich's squares can be used to illustrate the qubit state. We formulate the superposition principle of quantum states in terms of probabilities determining the quantum states. New formulas for nonlinear addition rules of probabilities providing the probabilities associated with the interfer…
Elaborating on a previous work by Han et al., we give a general, basis-independent proof of the necessity of negative probability measures in order for a class of local hidden-variable (LHV) models to violate the Bell-CHSH inequality. Moreover, we obtain general solutions for LHV-induced probability measures that reproduce any consistent set of probabilities.
In this paper we analyze the existence of joint probabilities for the Bell-type and GHZ entangled states. We then propose the usage of nonmonotonic upper probabilities as a tool to derive consistent joint upper probabilities for the contextual hidden variables. Finally, we show that for the extreme example of no error, the GHZ state allows for the definition of a joint upper probability that is consistent with the strong correlations.
Some forms of classical simulations of quantum type probabilities and correlations are capable of violating Boole's conditions of possible experience, such as the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt inequality, even beyond the Tsirelson bound. This can be achieved by communicating a single bit encoding the measurement context.
It is shown that 'non-quantum systems', with anomalous statistical properties, would carry a distinctive experimental signature. Such systems can exist in deterministic hidden-variables theories (such as the pilot-wave theory of de Broglie and Bohm). The signature consists of non-additive expectations for non-commuting observables, breaking the sinusoidal modulation of quantum probabilities for two-state systems. This effect is independent of the quantum state (pure or mixed), or of the details of the hidden-variables model. Experiments are proposed, testing polarisation probabilities for sing…
The basic Leggett inequalities, i.e. those inequalities in which the particular assumptions of Leggett's hidden-variable model (e.g. Malus law) were not yet introduced, are usually derived using hidden-variable distributions of probabilities (although in some cases completely general, positive probabilities would lead to the same result). This fact creates sometimes the illusion that these basic inequalities are a belonging of the hidden-variable theories and are bound to contradict the quantum theory. In the present text the basic Leggett inequalities are derived in the most general way, i.e.…
A principle of information conservation is shown in abstract terms to rule out probabilistic physical laws, necessitating the existence of state trajectories. It furthermore provides a geometric-thermodynamic mechanism for the appearance of probability distributions at the operational level, and thus may provide a dynamical explanation for Born's rule of quantum probabilities. This link between geometry and operational probabilities is argued to be a promising angle from which to study the potential for "hidden information" in quantum systems, and guide efforts in quantum foundations more gene…
We consider black-hole evaporation from a hidden-variables perspective. It is suggested that Hawking information loss, associated with the transition from a pure to a mixed quantum state, is compensated for by the creation of deviations from Born-rule probabilities outside the event horizon. The resulting states have non-standard or 'nonequilibrium' distributions of hidden variables, with a specific observable signature - a breakdown of the sinusoidal modulation of quantum probabilities for two-state systems. Outgoing Hawking radiation is predicted to contain statistical anomalies outside the …
Recently, Roger Colbeck and Renato Renner (C&R) have claimed that '[n]o extension of quantum theory can have improved predictive power'. If correct, this is a spectacular impossibility theorem for hidden variable theories, which is more general than the theorems of Bell and Leggett. C&R's claim essentially means that in any hidden variable theory that is compatible with quantum-mechanical predictions, probabilities of measurement outcomes are independent of these hidden variables. On closer inspection, however, the generality and validity of the claim can be contested. First, it is based on an…
We discuss some issues about probability in quantum mechanics, with particular emphasis on the GHZ theorem. We propose the usage of nonmonotonic upper probabilities as a tool to derive consistent joint upper probabilities for systems where only contextual hidden variables are possible.
Every quantum physical system can be considered the ''shadow'' of a special kind of classical system. The system proposed here is classical mainly because each observable function has a well precise value on each state of the system: an hypothetical observer able to prepare the system exactly in an assigned state and able to build a measuring apparatus perfectly corresponding to a required observable gets always the same real value. The same system considered instead by an unexpert observer, affected by the ignorance of a hidden variable, is described by a statistical theory giving exactly and…
No physical measurement can be performed with infinite precision. This leaves a loophole in the standard no-go arguments against non-contextual hidden variables. All such arguments rely on choosing special sets of quantum-mechanical observables with measurement outcomes that cannot be simulated non-contextually. As a consequence, these arguments do not exclude the hypothesis that the class of physical measurements in fact corresponds to a dense subset of all theoretically possible measurements with outcomes and quantum probabilities that \emph{can} be recovered from a non-contextual hidden var…
In this paper we address the question as to what extent the quantum-mechanical nature of the process is relevant for teleportation of A spin-1/2 state. For this purpose we analyze the possibility of underpinning teleportation with a local-hidden-variable model. The nature of the models, which we consider as legitimate candidates, guarantees the classical character of all the probabilities which can be deduced from them. When we try to describe the teleportation process following two different mathematical routes, we find two different hidden-variable densities, which thus end up having a doubt…
Due to recent important work of Zyczkowski and Sommers (quant-ph/0302197 and quant-ph/0304041), exact formulas are available (both in terms of the Hilbert-Schmidt and Bures metrics) for the (n^2-1)-dimensional and (n(n-1)/2-1)-dimensional volumes of the complex and real n x n density matrices. However, no comparable formulas are available for the volumes (and, hence, probabilities) of various separable subsets of them. We seek to clarify this situation for the Hilbert-Schmidt metric for the simplest possible case of n=4, that is, the two-qubit systems. Making use of the density matrix (rho) pa…
We investigate the possibility of deriving analytical formulas for the 15-dimensional separable volumes, in terms of any of a number of metrics of interest (Hilbert-Schmidt [HS], Bures,...), of the two-qubit (four-level) systems. This would appear to require 15-fold symbolic integrations over a complicated convex body (defined by both separability and feasibility constraints). The associated 15-dimensional integrands -- in terms of the Tilma-Byrd-Sudarshan Euler-angle-based parameterization of the 4 x 4 density matrices ρ(math-ph/0202002) -- would be the products of 12-dimensional Haar measure…
In this article, we propose a resolution to the paradox of apparent superluminal velocities for tunneling particles, by a careful treatment of temporal observables in quantum theory and through a precise application of the duality between particles and waves. To this end, we employ a new method for constructing probabilities associated to quantum time measurements that provides an explicit link between the tunneling time of particles and the associated quantum fields. We demonstrate that the idea of faster-than-light speeds in tunneling follows from an inadmissible use of classical reasoning i…
No-Signalling is a fundamental constraint on the probabilistic predictions made by physical theories. It is usually justified in terms of the constraints imposed by special relativity. However, this justification is not as clear-cut as is usually supposed. We shall give a different perspective on this condition by showing an equivalence between No-Signalling and Lambda Independence, or "free choice of measurements", a condition on hidden-variable theories which is needed to make no-go theorems such as Bell's theorem non-trivial. More precisely, we shall show that a probability table describing…
Quantum non-locality tests have been of interest since the 1960's paper by Bell on the original EPR paradox.The present paper discusses whether the CGLMP (Bell) inequalities are possible tests for showing that quantum theory is not underpinned by local hidden variable theory (LHVT). It is found by applying Fine's theorem that the CGLMP approach involves a LHVT for the joint probabilities associated with the measurement of one observable from each of the two sub-systems, even though the underlying probabilities for joint measurements of all four observables may involve a non-local HVT. The latt…
The celebrating theorem of A. Fine implies that the CHSH inequality is violated if and only if the joint probability distribution for the quadruples of observables involved the EPR-Bohm-Bell experiment does not exist, i.e., it is impossible to use the classical probabilistic model (Kolmogorov, 1933). In this note we demonstrate that, in spite of Fine's theorem, the results of observations in the EPR-Bohm-Bell experiment can be described in the classical probabilistic framework. However, the "quantum probabilities" have to be interpreted as conditional probabilities, where conditioning is with …
Two problems will be considered: the question of hidden parameters and the problem of Kolmogorovity of quantum probabilities. Both of them will be analyzed from the point of view of two distinct understandings of quantum mechanical probabilities. Our analysis will be focused, as a particular example, on the Aspect-type EPR experiment. It will be shown that the quantum mechanical probabilities appearing in this experiment can be consistently understood as conditional probabilities without any paradoxical consequences. Therefore, nothing implies in the Aspect experiment that quantum theory is in…
A generalized Bloch sphere, in which the states of a quantum entity of arbitrary dimension are geometrically represented, is investigated and further extended, to also incorporate the measurements. This extended representation constitutes a general solution to the measurement problem, inasmuch it allows to derive the Born rule as an average over hidden-variables, describing not the state of the quantum entity, but its interaction with the measuring system. According to this modelization, a quantum measurement is to be understood, in general, as a tripartite process, formed by an initial determ…
The action of the quantum mechanical volume operator, introduced in connection with a symmetric representation of the three-body problem and recently recognized to play a fundamental role in discretized quantum gravity models, can be given as a second order difference equation which, by a complex phase change, we turn into a discrete Schrödinger-like equation. The introduction of discrete potential-like functions reveals the surprising crucial role here of hidden symmetries, first discovered by Regge for the quantum mechanical 6j symbols; insight is provided into the underlying geometric featu…
We reexamine a recent analysis in which, using the volume of the associated quantum steering ellipsoid (QES) as a measure, we sought to estimate the probability that a two-qubit state is separable. In the estimation process, we, in effect, sought to attach to states random with respect to Hilbert-Schmidt (HS) measure, the corresponding QES volumes. However, a study of the relations between HS and Bures ensembles and their well-supported separability probabilities of $\frac{8}{33}$ and $\frac{25}{341}$, respectively, now lead us to explore as a possible alternative measure, the QES volume divid…
A hidden variable model reproducing the quantum mechanical probabilities for a spin singlet is presented. The model violates only the hypothesis of independence of the distribution for the hidden variables from the detectors settings and vice versa (Measurement Independence). It otherwise satisfies the hypotheses of Setting Independence, Outcome Independence -- made in the derivation of Bell inequality -- and that of compliance with Malus's Law -- made in the derivation of Leggett inequality. It is shown that the violation of the Measurement Independence hypothesis may be explained alternative…
The structure of a local hidden variable model for experiments involving sequences of measurements rigorously is analyzed. Constraints imposed by local realism on the conditional probabilities of the outcomes of such measurement schemes are explicitly derived. The violation of local realism in the case of ``hidden nonlocality'' is illustrated by an operational example.
Bell's theorem is supposed to exclude all local hidden-variable models of quantum correlations. However, an explicit counterexample shows that a new class of local realistic models, based on generalized arithmetic and calculus, can exactly reconstruct rotationally symmetric quantum probabilities typical of two-electron singlet states. Observable probabilities are consistent with the usual arithmetic employed by macroscopic observers, but counterfactual aspects of Bell's theorem are sensitive to the choice of hidden-variable arithmetic and calculus. The model is classical in the sense of Einste…
Bipartite quantum entangled systems can exhibit measurement correlations that violate Bell inequalities, revealing the profoundly counter-intuitive nature of the physical universe. These correlations reflect the impossibility of constructing a joint probability distribution for all values of all the different properties observed in Bell inequality tests. Physically, the impossibility of measuring such a distribution experimentally, as a set of relative frequencies, is due to the quantum back-action of projective measurements. Weakly coupling to a quantum probe, however, produces minimal back-a…
A fundamental issue for any quantum cosmological theory is to specify how probabilities can be assigned to various quantum events or sequences of events such as the occurrence of singularities or bounces. In previous work, we have demonstrated how this issue can be successfully addressed within the consistent histories approach to quantum theory for Wheeler-DeWitt-quantized cosmological models. In this work, we generalize that analysis to the exactly solvable loop quantization of a spatially flat, homogeneous and isotropic cosmology sourced with a massless, minimally coupled scalar field known…
While the standard approach to quantum systems studies length preserving linear transformations of wave functions, the Markov picture focuses on trace preserving operators on the space of Hermitian (self-adjoint) matrices. The Markov approach extends the standard one and provides a refined analysis of measurements and quantum Markov chains. In particular, Bell's inequality becomes structurally clear. It turns out that hidden state models are natural in the Markov context. In particular, a violation of Bell's inequality is seen to be compatible with the existence of hidden states. The Markov mo…
Quantum theory does not provide a unique definition for the joint probability of two non-commuting observables, which is the next important question after the Born's probability for a single observable. Instead, various definitions were suggested, e.g. via quasi-probabilities or via hidden-variable theories. After reviewing open issues of the joint probability, we relate it to quantum imprecise probabilities, which are non-contextual and are consistent with all constraints expected from a quantum probability. We study two non-commuting observables in a two-dimensional Hilbert space and show th…
We introduce for a general correlation scenario a new simulation model, a local quasi hidden variable (LqHV) model, where locality and the measure-theoretic structure inherent to an LHV model are preserved but positivity of a simulation measure is dropped. We specify a necessary and sufficient condition for LqHV modelling and, based on this, prove that every quantum correlation scenario admits an LqHV simulation. Via the LqHV approach, we construct analogs of Bell-type inequalities for an N-partite quantum state and find a new analytical upper bound on the maximal violation by an N-partite qua…
We use Bub's (2016) correlation arrays and Pitowksy's (1989b) correlation polytopes to analyze an experimental setup due to Mermin (1981) for measurements on the singlet state of a pair of spin-$\frac12$ particles. The class of correlations allowed by quantum mechanics in this setup is represented by an elliptope inscribed in a non-signaling cube. The class of correlations allowed by local hidden-variable theories is represented by a tetrahedron inscribed in this elliptope. We extend this analysis to pairs of particles of arbitrary spin. The class of correlations allowed by quantum mechanics i…
In previous studies, we have explored the ansatz that the volume elements of the Bures metrics over quantum systems might serve as prior distributions, in analogy to the (classical) Bayesian role of the volume elements ("Jeffreys' priors") of Fisher information metrics. Continuing this work, we obtain exact Bures probabilities that the members of certain low-dimensional subsets of the fifteen-dimensional convex set of 4 x 4 density matrices are separable or classically correlated. The main analytical tools employed are symbolic integration and a formula of Dittmann (quant-ph/9908044) for Bures…
We specify the local quasi hidden variable (LqHV) model reproducing the probabilistic description of all N-partite joint von Neumann measurements on an N-qudit state. Via this local probability model, we derive a new upper bound on the maximal violation by an N-qudit state of N-partite Bell inequalities of any type (either on correlation functions or on joint probabilities) for S observables per site. This new upper bound not only improves for all N, S and d the corresponding results available for general Bell inequalities in the literature but also, for the N-qubit case with two observables p…
