Descrizione del progetto
Indagare le possibili conseguenze della fisica non deterministica
La meccanica quantistica descrive il regno microscopico che si comporta in modo notevolmente diverso dalla nostra esperienza macroscopica quotidiana. Mentre le equazioni della fisica classica aiutano a calcolare e a prevedere gli eventi futuri con perfetta precisione, l’universo quantistico è fondamentalmente probabilistico. Un esempio importante che viola le leggi fondamentali della natura è la non località, in grado di descrivere la capacità degli oggetti di conoscere istantaneamente lo stato degli altri, anche quando sono separati da grandi distanze. Il progetto FLQuant, finanziato dall’UE, intende estendere il non determinismo oltre la non località. In particolare, i ricercatori esamineranno casi recentemente scoperti di ordine causale indefinito e casi senza paradosso in cui il futuro può influenzare il passato.
Obiettivo
Quantum mechanics is fundamentally different from all that came before in almost every aspect. But, as far as I can see now, there is one property that stands above all when we try to understand what quantum mechanics is all about: quantum mechanics is our first theory of Nature that is non-deterministic at a fundamental level. Long considered an unpleasant aspect, non-determinism is anything but: Non-determinism enables new freedoms. Phenomena that could not occur in deterministic theories because they would violate some basic laws of nature become possible in non-deterministic theories, under the cover of randomness. A famous example is nonlocality. In a deterministic world, if something acting in one place would instantaneously produce effects somewhere else, it would violate relativity; non-determinism allows it. As in recent years nonlocality/entanglement came to be viewed as one of the main aspects of nature, and as its existence implies non- determinism but not vice-versa, non-determinism itself was seen as secondary. But non-determinism allows many more freedoms. The vision of this project is to change the paradigm, and put non-determinism at the core. The aim is to go well beyond the insights gained from nonlocality and focus on the other freedoms. It will explore very recently discovered situations with indefinite causal order; situations in which the future can affect the past without leading to paradoxes; evolutions subjected to both initial and final conditions; implications for conservations laws, and thermodynamics, the hitherto ignored dynamic nonlocality, etc. – all fundamental aspects of nature in which non-determinism is the key. Finally, quantum mechanics may not be the ultimate theory of nature. The project aims to explore the full extent of the freedoms allowed by non-determinism in quantum mechanics as well as in arbitrary theories. By comparing what is possible in general to what is specifically quantum, I hope to better understand both.
Campo scientifico
Programma(i)
Argomento(i)
Meccanismo di finanziamento
ERC-ADG - Advanced GrantIstituzione ospitante
BS8 1QU Bristol
Regno Unito