science = determinism?

[Erik Max Francis]

"Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz" wrote:

> Tim Bradshaw wrote:
> 
> > And an assumption that has been generally understood to be wrong for
> > about 70 years, since the discovery of quantum mechanics.  There are
> > `deterministic' explanations of QM -- in particular the many-worlds
> > theory -- but they don't help you actually predict things as you
> > can't
> > tell which world you'll end up in until you make the experiment.
> 
> Sure you can; you wind up in all of them. And the prediction of
> amplitudes for each of the "eigenyou"s coincides with the prediction
> of
> the amplitudes for each of the outcomes in the Copenhagen
> interpretation. Subjectively it still appears random, because the
> different yous correspond to orthogonal states.

His point was that the Everett ("manyworlds") interpretation, just like
the Copenhagen interpretation, is just that -- an interpretation.  It
adds no predictive value to the theory, and thus is just a way of
attempting to reconcile quantum mechanics with common sense.  When
you're actually doing quantum mechanical calculations, it makes no
difference which interpretation you favor.

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