Description
Book SynopsisThis lively account of the foundations of quantum mechanics is at once elementary and deeply challenging. It is an introduction accessible to anyone with high school mathematics and, at the same time, a rigorous discussion of the most important recent advances in our understanding of quantum physics, a number of them made by the author himself.
Trade ReviewOver the past two decades, philosophers of physics have worked long and hard…to extract the philosophical pith from the theoretical physics. There are now a number of excellent books which explain the issues at a reasonably advanced level to non-physicists. Albert’s is among the best of the bunch. -- David Papineau * Times Literary Supplement *
A lively, lucid, elementary, yet deeply challenging account. The layperson and seasoned philosopher and scientist alike could do no better in their attempts to get out of the quantum muddle than to read this book. -- Frank Arntzenius, University of Southern California
This is a wholly original, engaging, and provocative work on the conceptual foundations of quantum mechanics, written in David Albert’s inimitable style. -- Jeffrey Bub, University of Maryland
Table of ContentsPreface 1. Superposition 2. The Mathematical Formalism and the Standard Way of Thinking about It 3. Nonlocality 4. The Measurement Problem 5. The Collapse of the Wave Function 6. The Dynamics by Itself 7. Bohm's Theory 8. Self-Measurement Appendix: The Kochen-Healy-Dieks Interpretations Bibliography Index
