Weak values and consistent histories in quantum theory

DOI10.1016/J.SHPSB.2003.02.001MaRDI QIDQ720582zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Ruth E. Kastner

Publication date 17 October 2011

Published in Studies in History and Philosophy of Science. Part B. Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0207182

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

General and philosophical questions in quantum theory (81P05)

Abstract: A relation is obtained between weak values of quantum observables and the consistency criterion for histories of quantum events. It is shown that ``strange weak values for projection operators (such as values less than zero) always correspond to inconsistent families of histories. It is argued that using the ABL rule to obtain probabilities for counterfactual measurements corresponding to those strange weak values gives inconsistent results. This problem is shown to be remedied by using the conditional weight, or pseudo-probability, obtained from the multiple-time application of Luders' Rule. It is argued that an assumption of reverse causality (a form of time symmetry) implies that weak values obtain, in a restricted sense, at the time of the weak measurement as well as at the time of post-selection. Finally, it is argued that weak values are more appropriately characterised as multiple-time amplitudes than expectation values, and as such can have little to say about counterfactual questions.

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Cites work

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• Consistent Quantum Theory
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Cited in

(14)

• Weak values in collision theory
• Quantum mechanics as a consistency condition on initial and final boundary conditions
• The transactional interpretation, counterfactuals, and weak values in quantum theory
• Weak values as context dependent values of observables and Born's rule
• Strange weak values
• Quantum weak values and logic: an uneasy couple
• What is a quantum-mechanical ``weak value the value of?
• Weak values as context-dependent values of observables and Born’s rule
• Weak values and the Aharonov–Vaidman gauge
• Non-representative quantum mechanical weak values
• Restrictions on the existence of weak values in quantum mechanics: weak quantum evolution concept
• Weak values and modular variables from a quantum phase-space perspective
• Counterfactual reasoning in time-symmetric quantum mechanics
• Time-dependent weak values and their intrinsic phases of evolution

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