Wigner’s Friend Extended Thought Experiment. A Philosophers’ look
Year: 2022
Type: article
Abstract: Frauchiger and Renner (2018) presented a no-go theorem inspired by \nthe well-known Wigner’s friend paradox. Their work is a remarkable contribution to \nthe foundations of quantum mechanics, insofar as it allows evaluation of the interpretations of the theory based on the assumptions that must be dropped to circumvent \nthe contradiction. This paper aims to review the philosophically salient aspects of \nthe paradox. To do so, we firstly introduce the original Wigner’s paradox and its \nconsequences. Then we make explicit the logical structure of the extended paradox \nthrough the aid of multi-agent epistemic logic. Such work is useful not only for \npresenting a more accessible formulation of the paradox but also for evaluating its \nbearings on the main interpretations of quantum mechanics. We conclude that despite \nthe fact that prima facie the paradox encourages an antirealist view, some possibilities \nare left open for realist interpretations of quantum mechanics
Authors: Alberto Corti, Vincenzo Fano, Gino Tarozzi
Language: English
Subfield: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7072047502