Chen (quant-ph/0611126) has recently claimed ``exponential violation of local realism by separable states", in the sense that multi-partite separable quantum states are supposed to give rise to correlations and fluctuations that violate a Bell-type inequality that Chen takes to be satisfied by local realism. However, this can not be true since all predictions (including all correlations and fluctuations) that separable quantum states give rise to have a local realistic description and thus satisfy all Bell-type inequalities, and this holds for all number of parties. Since Chen claims otherwise by presenting a new inequality, claimed to be a Bell-type one, which separable states supposedly can violate, there must be a flaw in the argumentation. I will expose this flaw, not merely for clarification of this issue, but perhaps even more importantly since it re-teaches us an old lesson John Bell taught us over 40 years ago. I will argue that this lesson provides us with a new morale especially relevant to modern research in Bell-type inequalities.
We introduce a two-observer all-versus-nothing proof of Bell's theorem which reduces the number of required quantum predictions from 9 [A. Cabello, Phys. Rev. Lett. 87, 010403 (2001); Z.-B. Chen et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 90, 160408 (2003)] to 4, provides a greater amount of evidence against local realism, reduces the detection efficiency requirements for a conclusive experimental test of Bell's theorem, and leads to a Bell's inequality which resembles Mermin's inequality for three observers [N. D. Mermin, Phys. Rev. Lett. 65, 1838 (1990)] but requires only two observers.
Hardy's is one of the simplest arguments concerning non-locality. Recently Chen et. al. have proposed a more generalized Hardy-like argument and have shown that the probability of success increases with local system's dimension. Here we study the same in a minimally constrained theory, namely the generalized no-signaling theory(GNST). We find that not only the probability of success of this argument increases with local system dimension in GNST, it also takes a very simple functional form.
We show that quantum mechanics predicts a contradiction with local hidden variable theories for photon number measurements which have limited resolving power, to the point of imposing an uncertainty in the photon number result which is macroscopic in absolute terms. We show how this can be interpreted as a failure of a new premise, macroscopic local realism.
A necessary and natural change in our application of quantum mechanics to separated systems is shown to reconcile quantum mechanics and local realism. An analysis of separation and localization justifies the proposed change in application of quantum mechanics. An important EPRB experiment is reconsidered and it is seen that when it is correctly interpreted it supports local realism. This reconciliation of quantum mechanics with local realism allows the axiom sets of quantum mechanics, probability, and special relativity to be joined in a consistent global axiom set for physics.
The conjecture is made that quantum mechanics is compatible with local hidden variables (or local realism). The conjecture seems to be ruled out by the theoretical argument of Bell, but it is supported by the empirical fact that nobody has been able to perform a loophole-free test of local realism in spite of renewed effort during almost 40 years.
We show that EPR's criterion of reality leads to contradictions in quantum mechanics. When locality is assumed, an inequality involving only one particle is violated, while when parameter and outcome dependence are assumed, EPR-realism is shown to be not Lorentz invariant. Quantum mechanics is both non-local and non-realistic.
From an operational criterion of physical reality, a quantifier of realism-based nonlocality was recently introduced for two-part quantum states. This measure has shown to capture aspects that are rather different from Bell nonlocality. Here we take a step further and introduce a tripartite realism-based nonlocality quantifier. We show that this measure reduces to genuine tripartite entanglement for a certain class of pure tripartite states and manifests itself in correlated mixed states even in the absence of quantum correlations. A case study for noisy GHZ and W states points out the existen…
We show that local realism applied to states characterized by a single quanta equally and coherently shared between a number of qubits (so-called W states) produces predictions incompatible with quantum theory. The origin of this incompatibility is shown to originate from the destructive interference of amplitude probabilities associated with nonlocal states, a phenomenon that has no classical analog.
Quantum codewords are highly entangled combinations of two-state systems. The standard assumptions of local realism lead to logical contradictions similar to those found by Bell, Kochen and Specker, Greenberger, Horne and Zeilinger, and Mermin. The new contradictions have some noteworthy features that did not appear in the older ones.
What ontology does realism about the quantum state suggest? The main extant view in contemporary philosophy of physics is wave-function realism. We elaborate the sense in which wave-function realism does provide an ontological picture; and defend it from certain objections that have been raised against it. However, there are good reasons to be dissatisfied with wave-function realism, as we go on to elaborate. This motivates the development of an opposing picture: what we call spacetime state realism; a view which takes the states associated to spacetime regions as fundamental. This approach en…
Fundamental principle of classical physics -- local realism, means that freely chosen observations can be explained by a local (slower than light) real process. It is apparently violated in quantum mechanics as shown by Bell theorem. Despite extreme efforts experiments have not conclusively confirmed this violation due to loopholes. We propose a new postulate that the description of quantum processes must be consistent with local realism, It also assumes existence of many worlds/copies of the same system, interacting weakly microscopically but strongly macroscopically, whose number can be esti…
We propose a new Wigner inequality suitable for test of the hypothesis of realism. We show that this inequality is not identical neither to the well-known Wigner inequality nor to the Leggett-Garg inequality in Wigner form. The obtained inequality is suitable for test of realism not only in quantum mechanical systems, but also in quantum field systems. Also we propose a mathematically consistent derivation of the Leggett--Garg inequality in Wigner form, which was recently presented in the literature, for three and $n$ distinct moments of time. Contrary to these works, our rigor derivation uses…
Macro-realism is the position that certain "macroscopic" observables must always possess definite values: e.g. the table is in some definite position, even if we don't know what that is precisely. The traditional understanding is that by assuming macro-realism one can derive the Leggett-Garg inequalities, which constrain the possible statistics from certain experiments. Since quantum experiments can violate the Leggett-Garg inequalities, this is taken to rule out the possibility of macro-realism in a quantum universe. However, recent analyses have exposed loopholes in the Leggett-Garg argument…
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.
An ensemble consisting on systems of two entangled spin 1/2 particles, all of them in the same global quantum state, are considered. The two spins are measured, each of them, on a fixed direction, at two randomly selected measurement times. Realism, plus locality and freedom of choice referred to these chosen times, are assumed. Then, from the sole correlation function related to the two measurements, without considering any Bell inequalities, a contradiction between these assumptions and quantum mechanics is found.
The emergence of an objective reality in line with the laws of the microscopic world has been the focus of longstanding debates. Recent approaches seem to have reached a consensus at least with respect to one aspect, namely, that the encoding of information about a given observable in a physical degree of freedom is a necessary condition for such observable to become an element of the physical reality. Taking this as a fundamental premise and inspired by quantum information theory, here we build an axiomatization for quantum realism -- a notion of realism compatible with quantum theory. Our st…
A standard approach in the foundations of quantum mechanics studies local realism and hidden variables models exclusively in terms of violations of Bell-like inequalities. Thus quantum nonlocality is tied to the celebrated no-go theorems, and these comprise a long list that includes the Kochen-Specker and Bell theorems, as well as elegant refinements by Mermin, Peres, Hardy, GHZ, and many others. Typically entanglement or carefully prepared multipartite systems have been considered essential for violations of local realism and for understanding quantum nonlocality. Here we show, to the contrar…
Employing a procedure called monitoring---via a completely positive trace-preserving map that is able to interpolate between weak and projective measurements---we investigate the resilience of the recently proposed realism-based nonlocality to local and bilocal weak measurements. This analysis indicates realism-based nonlocality as the most ubiquitous and persistent form of quantumness within a wide class of quantum-correlation quantifiers. In particular, we show that the set of states possessing this type of quantumness forms a strict superset of symmetrically discordant states and, therefore…
Generalised quantum measurements with two outcomes are fully characterised by two real parameters, dubbed as sharpness parameter and biasedness parameter and they can be linked with different aspects of the experimental setup. It is known that precision of measurements, characterised by the sharpness parameter of the measurements, reduces the possibility of probing quantum features like violation of local-realism (LR) or macro-realism (MR). Here we investigate the effect of biasedness together with sharpness of measurement and find a trade-off between those two parameters in the context of pro…
The logical foundations of Bell's inequality are reexamined. We argue that the form of the reality condition that underpins Bell's inequality comes from the requirement of solving the quantum measurement problem. Hence any violation of Bell's inequality necessarily implies nonlocality because of the measurement problem. The differences in the implications of deterministic and stochastic formulations of Bell's inequality are highlighted. The reality condition used in Bell's inequality is shown to be a generalisation of Einstein's later form of realism.
Mermin's observation [Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 65}, 1838 (1990)] that the magnitude of the violation of local realism, defined as the ratio between the quantum prediction and the classical bound, can grow exponentially with the size of the system is demonstrated using two-photon hyper-entangled states entangled in polarization and path degrees of freedom, and local measurements of polarization and path simultaneously.
In the standard quantum theory, one can measure precisely only a subset of the incompatible observables. It results in lack of a formal joint probability defining objective realism even if we accept nonlocal or certain faster-than-light interactions. We propose a construction of such realism extending the usual single-copy description to many copies, partially analogous to familiar many worlds. Failure of the standard single copy can be easily looked for experimentally. The copies should interact weakly at the macroscopic level, leading to effective collapse to a single identical pointer state…
Quantum mechanics is strictly incompatible with local realism. It has been shown by Bell and others that it is possible, in principle, to experimentally differentiate between local realism and quantum mechanics. Numerous experiments have attempted to falsify local realism; however, they have consistently failed to close the detection loophole under strict locality conditions, thereby allowing local realistic explanations for their observations. In 2015, three experiments took place that tested local realism without the impediments of these significant loopholes. Between these three experiments…
Hypergraph states form a family of multiparticle quantum states that generalizes the well-known concept of Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger states, cluster states, and more broadly graph states. We study the nonlocal properties of quantum hypergraph states. We demonstrate that the correlations in hypergraph states can be used to derive various types of nonlocality proofs, including Hardy-type arguments and Bell inequalities for genuine multiparticle nonlocality. Moreover, we show that hypergraph states allow for an exponentially increasing violation of local realism which is robust against loss of …
A recent claim by Bassi and Ghirardi that the consistent (decoherent) histories approach cannot provide a realistic interpretation of quantum theory is shown to be based upon a misunderstanding of the single-framework rule: they have replaced the correct rule with a principle which directly contradicts it. It is their assumptions, not those of the consistent histories approach, which lead to a logical contradiction.
Macroscopic realism, the classical world view that macroscopic objects exist independently of and are not influenced by measurements, is usually tested using Leggett-Garg inequalities. Recently, another necessary condition called no-signaling in time (NSIT) has been proposed as a witness for non-classical behavior. In this paper, we show that a combination of NSIT conditions is not only necessary but also sufficient for a macrorealistic description of a physical system. Any violation of macroscopic realism must therefore be witnessed by a suitable NSIT condition. Subsequently, we derive an ope…
We describe a gedanken experiment with an interferometer in the case of pre- and postselection in two different time symmetric ways: We apply the ABL formalism and the de Broglie--Bohm model. Interpreting these descriptions ontologically, we get two very different concepts of reality. Finally, we discuss some problems implied by these concepts.
I purport to show why old and new claims on the role of counterfactual reasoning for the EPR argument and the Bell theorem are unjustified: once the logical relation between locality and counterfactual reasoning is clarified, the use of the latter does no harm and the nonlocality result can well follow from the EPR premises. To show why, I critically review (i) incompleteness arguments that Einstein developed before the EPR paper, and (ii) more recent claims that equate the use of counterfactual reasoning with the assumption of a strong form of realism.
We define a quantum witness for high-mass matter-wave interferometers that allows us to test fundamental assumptions of macroscopic realism. We propose an experimental realisation using absorptive laser gratings and show that such systems can strongly violate a macrorealistic quantum-witness equality. The measurement of the witness can therefore provide clear evidence of physics beyond macrorealism for macromolecules and nanoparticles.
It is argued that local realism is a fundamental principle, which might be rejected only if experiments clearly show that it is untenable. A critical review is presented of the derivations of Bell's inequalities and the performed experiments, with the conclusion that no valid, loophole-free, test exists of local realism vs. quantum mechanics. It is pointed out that, without any essential modification, quantum mechanics might be compatible with local realism. This suggests that the principle may be respected by nature.
We consider relations between communication complexity problems and detecting correlations (violating local realism) with no local hidden variable model. We show first universal equivalence between characteristics of protocols used in that type of problems and non-signaling correlations. We construct non linear bipartite Bell type inequalities and strong nonlocality test with binary observables by providing general method of Bell inequalities construction and showing that existence of gap between quantum and classical complexity leads to violation of these inequalities. We obtain, first to our…
We introduce two two-player quantum pseudo-telepathy games based on two recently proposed all-versus-nothing (AVN) proofs of Bell's theorem [A. Cabello, Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 210401 (2005); Phys. Rev. A 72, 050101(R) (2005)]. These games prove that Broadbent and Methot's claim that these AVN proofs do not rule out local-hidden-variable theories in which it is possible to exchange unlimited information inside the same light-cone (quant-ph/0511047) is incorrect.
I argue that quantum mechanics is a realistic theory, but it violates either strong locality (no superluminal influences) or strict causality (diiferent effects cannot follow from the same cause).
Why do we not experience a violation of macroscopic realism in every-day life? Normally, no violation can be seen either because of decoherence or the restriction of coarse-grained measurements, transforming the time evolution of any quantum state into a classical time evolution of a statistical mixture. We find the sufficient condition for these classical evolutions for spin systems under coarse-grained measurements. Then we demonstrate that there exist "non-classical" Hamiltonians whose time evolution cannot be understood classically, although at every instant of time the quantum spin state …
We put bounds on the minimum detection efficiency necessary to violate local realism in Bell experiments. These bounds depends of simple parameters like the number of measurement settings or the dimensionality of the entangled quantum state. We derive them by constructing explicit local-hidden variable models which reproduce the quantum correlations for sufficiently small detectors efficiency.
We study the fluctuations of the work performed on a driven quantum system, defined as the difference between subsequent measurements of energy eigenvalues. These work fluctuations are governed by statistical theorems with similar expressions in classical and quantum physics. In this article we show that we can distinguish quantum and classical work fluctuations, as the latter can be described by a macrorealistic theory and hence obey Leggett-Garg inequalities. We show that these inequalities are violated by quantum processes in a driven two-level system and in a harmonic oscillator subject to…
.We expound an alternative to the Copenhagen interpretation of the formalism of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics. The basic difference is that the new interpretation is formulated in the language of epistemological realism. The ψ function is no longer interpreted as a probability amplitude of the observed behaviour of elementary particles but as an objective physical field representing the particles themselves. The particles are thus extended objects whose extension varies in time according to the variation of ψ. They are considered as fundamental regions of space with some kind of nonlocalit…
Realism -- the idea that the concepts in physical theories refer to 'things' existing in the real world -- is introduced as a tool to analyze the status of the wave-function. Although the physical entities are recognized by the existence of invariant quantities, examples from classical and quantum physics suggest that not all the theoretical terms refer to the entities: some terms refer to properties of the entities, and some terms have only an epistemic function. In particular, it is argued that the wave-function may be written in terms of classical non-referring and epistemic terms. The impl…
In contrast to the intuitively plausible assumption of local realism, entangled particles, even when isolated, are not allowed to possess definite properties in their own right, as quantitatively expressed by violations of Bell's inequalities [1]. Even as entanglement is now a key feature of quantum information and communication technology [2,3], it remains the most puzzling feature of quantum mechanics [4] and its conceptual foundation is still widely debated. Here we demonstrate that physical systems providing dicotomic outcomes are not able to guarantee both the rotation properties of physi…
Scientific realism in classical (i.e. pre-quantum) physics has remained compatible with the naive realism of everyday thinking on the whole; whereas it has proven impossible to find any consistent way to visualize the world underlying quantum theory in terms of our pictures in the everyday world. The general conclusion is that in quantum theory naive realism, although necessary at the level of observations, fails at the microscopic level. In this paper I offer a counter view that what fails in quantum theory is naive realism at the level of observations itself.
Macroscopic realism, as introduced by Leggett and Garg, is the world view in which properties of macroscopic systems exist independent of and are not influenced by measurement. Motivated by classical physical laws such as Newtonian mechanics or Maxwell's electrodynamics, in this work we add the restrictive postulate that the observables of macroscopic objects are evolved continuously through space and time. Quantum theory violates both macroscopic realism and the continuity assumption. While decoherence or collapse models (e.g. due to a universal noise background or gravitational self energy) …
Tests of local realism vs quantum mechanics based on Bell's inequality employ two entangled qubits. We investigate the general case of two entangled quNits, i.e. quantum systems defined in an N-dimensional Hilbert space. Via a numerical linear optimization method we show that violations of local realism are stronger for two maximally entangled quNits (N=3,4,...,9), than for two qubits and that they increase with N. The two quNit measurements can be experimentally realized using entangled photons and unbiased multiport beamsplitters.
We show using a numerical approach that gives necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of local realism, that the bound entangled state presented in Bennett et. al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 82, 5385 (1999) admits a local and realistic description. We also find the lowest possible amount of some appropriate entangled state that must be ad-mixed to the bound entangled state so that the resulting density operator has no local and realistic description and as such can be useful in quantum communication and quantum computation.
The codification in higher dimensional Hilbert Spaces (whose logical basis states are dubbed qudits in analogy with bidimensional qubits) presents various advantages both for Quantum Information applications and for studies on Foundations of Quantum Mechanics. Purpose of this review is to introduce qudits, to summarize their application to Quantum Communication and researches on Local Realism and, finally, to describe some recent experiment for realizing them. A Little more in details: after a short introduction, we will consider the advantages of testing local realism with qudits, discussing …
Most working scientists hold fast to the concept of 'realism' - a viewpoint according to which an external reality exists independent of observation. But quantum physics has shattered some of our cornerstone beliefs. According to Bell's theorem, any theory that is based on the joint assumption of realism and locality (meaning that local events cannot be affected by actions in space-like separated regions) is at variance with certain quantum predictions. Experiments with entangled pairs of particles have amply confirmed these quantum predictions, thus rendering local realistic theories untenabl…
The central focus of this work is to make progress towards understanding entanglement as a resource for computation by examining the quantum correlations that can be extracted from stabilizer states. As such, we focus on the stabilizer formalism, local realism, and the convergence of the two.
We show that for macroscopic measurements which cannot reveal full information about microscopic states of the system, the monogamy of Bell inequality violations present in quantum mechanics implies that practically all correlations between macroscopic measurements can be described by local realistic models. Our results hold for sharp measurement and arbitrary closed quantum systems.
The debate instigated by the seminal works of Einstein, Podolsky, Rosen, and Bell, put the notions of realism and nonlocality at the core of almost all philosophical and physical discussions underlying the foundations of quantum mechanics. However, while experimental criteria and quantifiers are by now well established for nonlocality, there is no clear quantitative measure for the degree of reality associated with continuous variables such as position and momentum. This work aims at filling this gap. Considering position and momentum as effectively discrete observables, we implement an operat…
A discussion of the quantum mechanical use of superposition or entangled states shows that descriptions containing only statements about state vectors and experiments outputs are the most suitable for Quantum Mechanics. In particular, it is shown that statements about the undefined values of physical quantities before measurement can be dropped without changing the predictions of the theory. If we apply these ideas to EPR issues, we find that the concept of non-locality with its 'instantaneous action at a distance' evaporates. Finally, it is argued that usual treatments of philosophical realis…
The usual entanglement swapping protocol can entangle two particles that never interact. Here we demonstrate an all-versus-nothing violation of local realism for a partial entanglement swapping process. A Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt-type inequality for two particles entangled by entanglement swapping is proposed for a practical experiment and can be violated quantum mechanically up to 4 beyond Cirel'son's bound 2sqr(2). Our result uncovers the intriguing nonlocal character of entanglement swapping and may lead to a conclusive (loophole-free) test of local realism versus quantum mechanics. The e…
We suggest to test the premise of ``macroscopic local realism'' which is sufficient to derive Bell inequalities when measurements of photon number are only accurate to an uncertainty of order $n$ photons, where $n$ is macroscopic. Macroscopic local realism is only sufficient to imply, in the context of the original Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen argument, fuzzy ``elements of reality'' which have a macroscopic indeterminacy. We show therefore how the violation of local realism in the presence of macroscopic uncertainties implies the failure of ``macroscopic local realism''. Quantum states violating th…
That quantum correlations can be generated over time between the spin and the position of a quantum walker is indisputable. The creation of bipartite entanglement has also been reported for two-walker systems. In this scenario, however, since the global state lies in a fourpartite Hilbert space, the question arises as to whether genuine multipartite entanglement may develop in time. Also, since the spatial degrees of freedom can be viewed as a noisy channel for the two-spin part, one may wonder how other nonclassical aspects, such as Bell nonlocality, Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering, quantum …
