Partitions, Objective Indefiniteness, and Quantum Reality by David Ellerman

Partitions, Objective Indefiniteness, and Quantum Reality by David Ellerman

This book presents a new ‘partitional' approach to understanding or interpreting the math of standard quantum mechanics (QM). The thesis is that the mathematics (not the physics) of QM is the Hilbert space version of the math of partitions on a set and, conversely, the math of partitions is a skeletonized set level version of the math of QM. Since at the set level, partitions are the mathematical tool to represent distinctions and indistinctions (or definiteness and indefiniteness), this approach shows how to interpret the key non-classical QM notion of superposition in terms of (objective) indefiniteness between definite alternatives (as opposed to seeing it as the sum of ‘waves'). Thus, the book develops a new mathematical, or indeed, logical, approach to the century-old problem of interpreting quantum mechanics, ensure it is of interest to philosophers of science as well as mathematicians and physicists.

David P. Ellerman is an Associate Researcher at the School of Social Science, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, and a Gordon Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study, Stellenbosch, South Africa. In 2003 he retired to academia after 10 years at the World Bank where he was the economic advisor and speech-writer for the Chief Economist Joseph Stiglitz. In his prior university teaching, Ellerman taught over a twenty-year period in the Boston area in five disciplines: economics, mathematics, computer science, operations research, and accounting. He was educated at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA), and at Boston University where he has two masters degrees, one in philosophy and one in economics, and a doctorate in mathematics. Ellerman has published many articles in scholarly journals, as well as several books in economics, logic, mathematics, physics, philosophy, and law.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9783031617850
ISBN 10	3031617851
Title	Partitions, Objective Indefiniteness, and Quantum Reality
Author	David Ellerman
Series	Springerbriefs In Philosophy
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Springer International Publishing AG
Year published	2024-08-21
Number of pages	117
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.