A Realist interpretation of quantum mechanics

Download

123072.pdf

Date

2002

Author

Kamözüt, Mehmet Cem

Metadata

Show full item record

Item Usage Stats

307
views

0
downloads

The idea of resolving a philosophical problem by reference to the authority of science is problematic. Nevertheless, such attempts spread among philosophers especially after the development of quantum theory. In this thesis I will argue that quantum mechanics cannot be used to support any forms of idealism or relativism. To this end, I introduce a realistic interpretation of quantum mechanics which is in many respects more favorable than the other alternatives suggested so far. The interpretation that I propose is based on a recent approach, namely the theory of decoherence to replace the postulate of wave-function collapse. The major advantage of the realist interpretation that I propose is that it does not change the ^deterministic character of quantum mechanics. I also introduce a sufficient condition for progress in science and argue that according to this criterion the decoherence theory should be accepted as a progress over the quantum mechanics.

Subject Keywords

Realism, Interpretations of quantum mechanics, Scientific progress

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/12464

Collections

Graduate School of Social Sciences, Thesis

Suggestions

OpenMETU
Core

Scientific realism debate in the philosophy of science Özer, Hüsnü; Bağçe, Samet; Department of Philosophy (2010) The primary concern of this piece of work is to reconsider scientific realism debate in the philosophy of science. Accordingly, the overall aim is to come up with the clues of a viable scientific realist attitude in the face of anti-realist interpretations of scientific theories. To accomplish this aim, I make use of two modified versions of scientific realism, that is, ‘epistemic structural realism’ and ‘entity realism’. Epistemic structural realism is a realist position of which proponents claim that the ...
Mental content and mentalistic causal explanation: a case against externalism Sarıhan, Işık; Temürcü, Ceyhan; Sayan, Erdinç; Department of Cognitive Sciences (2010) This thesis presents a defense of the view that externalism cannot be a theoretical basis of a mentalistic causal-explanatory science, even though such a theoretical basis is implicitly or explicitly adopted by many cognitive scientists. Externalism is a theory in philosophy of mind which states that mental properties are relations between the core realizers of an individual’s mental states (such as brain states) and certain things that exist outside those realizers (such as what the content of a mental sta...
Discrimination of quantum states under local operations and classical communication Güngör, Özenç; Turgut, Sadi; Department of Physics (2015) One dimensional molecular potentials are studied by solving the Schrödinger Equation for some well known potentials, such as the deformed Morse, Eckart and the Hua potentials. Parametric generalization of Hamiltonian Hierarchy is introduced. Nikiforov-Uvarov method and SUSYQM with Hamiltonian Hierarchy method is used in the calculations to get energy eigenvalues and the corresponding wave functions exactly.
Theoretical terms and the ontic structural realism Kaya, Nevzat; Bağçe, Samet; Department of Philosophy (2009) The main purpose of the present study is to show that scientific realism is still worth advocating despite its vulnerability in the face of anti-realist objections. For, it does not seem possible to ‘do science’ without realist commitments. The second purpose of this study is to investigate the plausibility of the novel versions of realism in the sense that whether they can satisfactorily respond to the anti-realist objections. Regarding the main purpose, I try to show that theoretical terms are neither red...
Values, practices, and philosophy of science Keler, Raşit Hasan; Grünberg, David; Department of Philosophy (2016) The main aim of philosophy of science is to clarify the nature of science. I believe that this can only be achieved by specifying the values and practices of particular scientific theories and research traditions. Therefore this text is about practices of sciences and in particular, about what scientists and scientific communities prefer about and choose the theories, research programs, models, tools, data, hypothesis, theoretical frameworks, and all kinds of things they employ. What needs to be done is not...

Citation Formats

M. C. Kamözüt, “A Realist interpretation of quantum mechanics,” Middle East Technical University, 2002.