Chaos as a Bridge between Determinism and Probability in Quantum Mechanics

Abstract

Quantum mechanics is fundamentally a probabilistic science, whereas classical mechanics is deterministic. This dichotomy has led to numerous disputes and confusion, ranging from the Einstein-Bohr debates of the 1930’s [Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen 1935; Bohr 1935], through attempts to establish determinism in quantum mechanics by means of introducing “hidden variables” [de Broglie 1960, de Broglie 1964; Bohm 1952], to lengthy discussions of epistemological versus ontological interpretations of quantum mechanics [Bohm and Hiley 1993]. Throughout most of the twentieth century the Copenhagen interpretation of Bohr and Heisenberg has endured as the orthodox interpretation, replete with contradictions and paradoxes such as duality, the necessity for an observer before a quantum system can attain physical meaning, and the reduction of the wave function upon observation. The reductio ad absurdum of such paradoxes was the example of Schrödinger’s cat [Schrödinger 1936; Gribben 1984, Gribben 1995], in which a cat inside a closed chamber remained in limbo as a linear superposition of −dead cat> +−live cat> until an observer determined whether or not a radioactive nucleus had decayed, releasing a deadly poison.