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Should we Explain the EPR Correlations Causally?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Andrew Elby
Andrew Elby*
Affiliation:
Department of Physics, University of California at Berkeley
*
‡Send reprint requests to the author, Department of Physics, 366 LeConte Hall, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.
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Abstract

Using three intuitive notions about causes, including Redhead's robustness condition, I formulate necessary conditions on partial causes. I then demonstrate that we cannot explain the EPR correlations in terms of partial causes unless we abandon the quantum mechanical framework and adopt a nonlocal hidden-variable theory. The argument, unlike its predecessors, does not appeal to relativity theory.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 59 , Issue 1 , March 1992 , pp. 16 - 25
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1992

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Footnotes

†

I would like to thank Professor Frank Arntzenius, Professor Michael Redhead and Dr. Jeremy Butterfield for helpful criticisms. This work, written in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge University, was supported by the Harvard Frank Knox Memorial Fellowship.

References

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