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Non-separability, locality and criteria of reality: a reply to Waegell and McQueen

Faglia, Paolo (2023) Non-separability, locality and criteria of reality: a reply to Waegell and McQueen. [Preprint]

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Abstract

Using a ‘reformulation of Bell’s theorem’, Waegell and McQueen (2020) argue that any empirically adequate theory that is local and does not involve retro-causation or fine-tuning must be a many-worlds theory. They go on to analyze several prominent many-worlds interpretations and conclude that non-separable many-worlds theories whose ontology is given by the wavefunction involve superluminal causation, while separable many-worlds theories (e.g. Waegell, 2021; Deutsch and Hayden 2000) do not.
I put forward three claims. (A) I challenge their argument for relying on a non- trivial, unquestioned assumption about elements of reality which allows Healey’s approach (Healey, 2017b) to evade their claim. In an attempt to respond to (A), Waegell and Mc- Queen may restrict their claim to theories which satisfy such an assumption, however, I also argue that (B) their argument fails to prove even the so weakened claim, as exem- plified by theories that are both non-separable and local. Finally, (C) by arguing for the locality of the decoherence-based Everettian approach (Wallace, 2012) I refute Waegell and McQueen’s claim that wavefunction-based ontologies, and more generally non-separable ontologies, involve superluminal causation. I close with some doubtful remarks about separable Everettian interpretations as compared to non-separable ones.

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Item Type: Preprint
Creators:
CreatorsEmailORCID
Faglia, Paolopaolo.faglia@icloud.com0000-0002-3125-9141
Keywords: Quantum theory, locality, non-separability, many-worlds
Subjects: Specific Sciences > Physics > Quantum Mechanics
Depositing User: Paolo Faglia
Date Deposited: 09 Feb 2024 22:01
Last Modified: 09 Feb 2024 22:01
Item ID: 23066
Subjects: Specific Sciences > Physics > Quantum Mechanics
Date: 2023
URI: https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/23066

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