dorsal/arxiv
View SchemaTwo theories of decoherence
| Authors | Ulrich Mohrhoff |
|---|---|
| Categories | |
| ArXiv ID | quant-ph/0108002 |
| URL | https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0108002 |
Abstract
Theories of decoherence come in two flavors---Platonic and Aristotelian. Platonists grant ontological primacy to the concepts and mathematical symbols by which we describe or comprehend the physical world. Aristotelians grant it to the physical world. The significance one attaches to the phenomenon of decoherence depends on the school to which one belongs. The debate about the significance of quantum states has for the most part been carried on between Platonists and Kantians, who advocate an epistemic interpretation, with Aristotelians caught in the crossfire. For the latter, quantum states are neither states of Nature nor states of knowledge. The real issue is not the kind of reality that we should attribute to quantum states but the reality of the spatial and temporal distinctions that we make. Once this is recognized, the necessity of attributing ontological primacy to facts becomes obvious, the Platonic stance becomes inconsistent, and the Kantian point of view becomes unnecessarily restrictive and unilluminating.
{
"annotation_id": "51a7c8a0-94ca-43d1-9a42-86650bcb0461",
"date_created": "2026-03-02T18:01:46.085000Z",
"date_modified": "2026-03-02T18:01:46.085000Z",
"file_hash": "838781721ef79d865ed4243f343e26ec935495ded3d5e8509098bae3b5b3ebd2",
"private": false,
"record": {
"abstract": "Theories of decoherence come in two flavors---Platonic and Aristotelian.\nPlatonists grant ontological primacy to the concepts and mathematical symbols\nby which we describe or comprehend the physical world. Aristotelians grant it\nto the physical world. The significance one attaches to the phenomenon of\ndecoherence depends on the school to which one belongs. The debate about the\nsignificance of quantum states has for the most part been carried on between\nPlatonists and Kantians, who advocate an epistemic interpretation, with\nAristotelians caught in the crossfire. For the latter, quantum states are\nneither states of Nature nor states of knowledge. The real issue is not the\nkind of reality that we should attribute to quantum states but the reality of\nthe spatial and temporal distinctions that we make. Once this is recognized,\nthe necessity of attributing ontological primacy to facts becomes obvious, the\nPlatonic stance becomes inconsistent, and the Kantian point of view becomes\nunnecessarily restrictive and unilluminating.",
"arxiv_id": "quant-ph/0108002",
"authors": [
"Ulrich Mohrhoff"
],
"categories": [
"quant-ph"
],
"title": "Two theories of decoherence",
"url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0108002"
},
"schema_id": "dorsal/arxiv",
"source": {
"execution_id": "ec831caa-c077-4223-a75e-df168c591002",
"id": "arXiv Dataset IDs",
"type": "Model",
"variant": "snapshot-2026-03-01",
"version": "0.1.0"
},
"user_id": 1000002
}