Welcome to AINS
NEWS:
We have recently organized an international conference at the University of Vienna (2011) on
Emergent Quantum Mechanics (EmerQuM11). See our conference webpage
Gerhard Groessing's talk as a pdf-file:
Herbert Schwabl's talk as a pdf-file:
Johannes Mesa Pascasio's poster as a pdf-file:
This is our most recent paper (2012): "An Explanation of Interference Effects in the Double Slit Experiment: Classical Trajectories plus Ballistic Diffusion caused by Zero-Point Fluctuations ", Annals of Physics 327 (2012) 421-437, quant-ph/arXiv:1106.5994.
An explanation of interference effects in the double slit experiment is proposed. We claim that for every single "particle" a thermal context can be defined, which reflects its embedding within boundary conditions as given by the totality of arrangements in an experimental apparatus. To account for this context, we introduce a "path excitation field", which derives from the thermodynamics of the zero-point vacuum and which represents all possible paths a "particle" can take via thermal path fluctuations. The intensity distribution on a screen behind a double slit is calculated, as well as the corresponding trajectories and the probability density current. The trajectories are shown to obey a "no crossing" rule with respect to the central line, i.e., between the two slits and orthogonal to their connecting line. This agrees with the Bohmian interpretation, but appears here without the necessity of invoking the quantum potential.
Classical computer simulation of the interference pattern, Fig.1: intensity distribution with increasing intensity from white through yellow and orange, with trajectories (red) for two Gaussian slits, and with small dispersion (evolution from bottom to top; v(x,1) = -v(x,2)). The trajectories follow a "no crossing" rule: particles from the left slit stay on the left side and vice versa for the right slit. This feature is explained here by a sub-quantum build-up of kinetic (heat) energy acting as an emergent repellor along the symmetry line.
Classical computer simulation of the interference pattern, Fig.2: intensity distribution with increasing intensity from white through yellow and orange, with trajectories (red) for two Gaussian slits, and with large dispersion (evolution from bottom to top; v(x,1) = v(x,2) = 0). The interference hyperbolas for the maxima characterize the regions where the phase difference phi = 2n(pi), and those with the minima lie at phi = (2n + 1)(pi), n = 0,1,2,... Note in particular the “kinks” of trajectories moving from the center-oriented side of one relative maximum to cross over to join more central (relative) maxima. In our classical explanation of interference, a detailed "micro-causal" account of the corresponding kinematics can be given.
There are four recent AINS papers from 2010/2011. One is entitled: "Emergence and Collapse of Quantum Mechanical Superposition: Orthogonality of Reversible Dynamics and Irreversible Diffusion ", Physica A 389, 21 (2010) 4473-4484. See also quant-ph/arXiv:1004.4596.
Based on the modelling of quantum systems with the aid of (classical) non-equilibrium thermodynamics, both the emergence and the collapse of the superposition principle are understood within one and the same framework. Both are shown to depend in crucial ways on whether or not an average orthogonality is maintained between reversible Schrödinger dynamics and irreversible processes of diffusion. Moreover, said orthogonality is already in full operation when dealing with a single free Gaussian wave packet. In an application, the quantum mechanical “decay of the wave packet” is shown to simply result from sub-quantum diffusion with a specific diffusivity varying in time due to a particle’s changing thermal environment. The exact quantum mechanical trajectory distributions and the velocity field of the Gaussian wave packet, as well as Born’s rule, are thus all derived solely from classical physics.
Dispersion of a free Gaussian wave packet: Considering the particles of a source as oscillating “bouncers”, they can be shown to “heat up” their (generally non-local) environment in such a way that the particles leaving the source (and thus becoming “walkers”) are guided through the thus created thermal “landscape”. In the Figures, the classically simulated evolution of exemplary averaged trajectories is shown (i.e., averaged over many single trajectories of Brownian-type motions). These trajectories are thus no “real” trajectories, but they only represent the averaged behaviour of a statistical ensemble. The results are in full agreement with quantum theory, and in particular with Bohmian trajectories. This is so despite the fact that no quantum mechanics is used in the calculations (i.e., neither a quantum mechanical wave function, nor a guiding wave equation, nor a quantum potential), but purely classical physics.
The Figures display a simulation with coupled map lattices of classical diffusion and a time-dependent diffusivity. Two examples are shown, with different halfwidths of the initial Gaussian distribution, respectively: (1+1)-dimensional space-time diagrams (time axis from bottom to top), with the intensity field and nine exemplary averaged trajectories. In a, the initial half width is twice as large as in b. Note that the narrower the Gaussian distribution is concentrated initially around the central position, the more the thus “stored” heat energy tends to push trajectories apart.
The second paper (70 pages) is a review paper of our recent works, entitled
"Sub-Quantum Thermodynamics as a Basis of Emergent Quantum Mechanics",
Entropy 12, 9 (2010) 1975-2044, in
a Special Issue on Nonequilibrium Thermodynamics.
...and these are two papers from 2011:
"Elements of sub-quantum thermodynamics: quantum motion as ballistic diffusion",
J. Phys.: Conf. Ser. (2011) 306 012046, doi: 10.1088/1742-6596/306/1/012046; based on a talk at the Fifth International Workshop DICE2010, Castiglioncello (Tuscany), September 13--17, 2010. See also quant-ph/arXiv:1005.1058.
"A Classical Explanation of Quantization", Found. Phys. 41, 9 (2011),1437-1453, doi: 10.1007/s10701-011-9556-1. See also quant-ph/arXiv:0812.3561.
