A first course in topos quantum theory (Q1931705)

This text presents a reformulation of quantum theory in terms of modern mathematical framework called topos theory. Topos theory unifies two seemingly wholly distinct mathematical subjects: on the one hand, topology and algebraic geometry, and on the other hand, logic and set theory. Chapters 4 and 5 introduce the basic notions of category theory, functors and natural transformations. Examples of elementary topoi in a category of presheaves are presented in Chapter 6. In Chapter 7 there are formulated the basic definitions of topos as a category with extra properties, on the one hand, and as a category for which all the categorical versions of set constructs exist and are well-defined, on the other hand. In Chapter 8 it is shown how the categorical constructs, needed to define a topos, are constructed in the category of presheaves. In Chapter 9 the author describes how topos quantum theory can be seen as a contextual quantum theory, in the sense that each element is defined as a collection of ``context dependent'' descriptions. Such context dependent descriptions will turn out to be classical snapshots. In Chapter 10 the author explains how propositions are represented in topos quantum theory. Topos analogues of states are formulated in Chapter 11. In Chapter 12 the author introduces the very important concept of truth values in a topos and shows how they are assigned to quantum propositions. In Chapter 13 the author introduces the quantity value object and shows that in topos quantum theory the quantity value object will be an object which has the same role as the reals have in standard quantum theory, but its elements will not be numbers. In Chapter 14 the author describes the concept of a sheaf: A sheaf is a presheaf with values in the category of sets that satisfies some axioms. The need for introducing sheaves is because the topos used to describe quantum theory have to be changed from the topos of presheaves to the topos of sheaves, which now seen not merely as a category but as a topological space. This change is required in order to introduce the concept of probabilities (Chapter 15) and of group transformations (Chapter 16) in topos quantum theory. This is one of the first text to address all of these aspects of topos quantum theory at the graduate student level.