Bohmian Mechanics and Quantum Theory: An Appraisal

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-viii

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2. Bohmian Mechanics: Background and Fundamentals

   1. The Causal Quantum Theory Program

      • James T. Cushing

      Pages 1-19

   2. Bohmian Mechanics as the Foundation of Quantum Mechanics

      • Detlef Dürr, Sheldon Goldstein, Nino Zanghì

      Pages 21-44

   3. Pilot-Wave Theory of Fields, Gravitation and Cosmology

      • Antony Valentini

      Pages 45-66

   4. Contextuality in Bohmian Mechanics

      • Lucien Hardy

      Pages 67-76

   5. Global Existence and Uniqueness of Bohmian Trajectories

      • Karin Berndl

      Pages 77-86

   6. Scattering Theory from a Bohmian Perspective

      • Martin Daumer

      Pages 87-97

   7. Is Quantum Mechanics Universal?

      • Peter R. Holland

      Pages 99-110

3. Applications and Further Developments of Bohmian Mechanics

   1. The “Tunneling-Time Problem” for Electrons

      • C. Richard Leavens

      Pages 111-129

   2. Local Bohmian Mechanics

      • Euan J. Squires

      Pages 131-140

   3. About Position Measurements Which do Not Show the Bohmian Particle Position

      • Yakir Aharonov, Lev Vaidman

      Pages 141-154

   4. An Ontological Interpretation of Boson Fields

      • P. N. Kaloyerou

      Pages 155-167

   5. De Broglie, Bohm and the Boson

      • Chris Dewdney, George Horton

      Pages 169-189

   6. A Realistic Formulation of Quantum Field Theory

      • Trevor M. Samols

      Pages 191-196

   7. Attaching Theories of Consciousness to Bohmian Quantum Mechanics

      • Don N. Page

      Pages 197-210

4. Historical, Conceptual and Philosophical Perspectives Related to Bohmian Mechanics

   1. Bohm and the “Inevitability” of Acausality

      • Mara Beller

      Pages 211-230

   2. On the Interpretation of Bohmian Mechanics

      • Arthur Fine

      Pages 231-250

   3. Tension in Bohm’s Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics

      • Millard Baublitz, Abner Shimony

      Pages 251-264

   4. An Epistemological Critique of Bohmian Mechanics

      • Robin Collins

      Pages 265-276

   5. Elementary Quantum Metaphysics

      • David Z. Albert

      Pages 277-284

We are often told that quantum phenomena demand radical revisions of our scientific world view and that no physical theory describing well defined objects, such as particles described by their positions, evolving in a well defined way, let alone deterministically, can account for such phenomena. The great majority of physicists continue to subscribe to this view, despite the fact that just such a deterministic theory, accounting for all of the phe­ nomena of nonrelativistic quantum mechanics, was proposed by David Bohm more than four decades ago and has arguably been around almost since the inception of quantum mechanics itself. Our purpose in asking colleagues to write the essays for this volume has not been to produce a Festschrift in honor of David Bohm (worthy an undertaking as that would have been) or to gather together a collection of papers simply stating uncritically Bohm's views on quantum mechanics. The central theme around which the essays in this volume are arranged is David Bohm's version of quantum mechanics. It has by now become fairly standard practice to refer to his theory as Bohmian mechanics and to the larger conceptual framework within which this is located as the causal quantum theory program. While it is true that one can have reservations about the appropriateness of these specific labels, both do elicit distinc­ tive images characteristic of the key concepts of these approaches and such terminology does serve effectively to contrast this class of theories with more standard formulations of quantum theory.

• Bohmian mechanics
• Boson
• quantum field theory
• quantum mechanics
• science

• Department of Physics, University of Notre Dame, USA

  James T. Cushing

• Department of Philosophy, Northwestern University, USA

  Arthur Fine

• Department of Mathematics, Rutgers University, USA

  Sheldon Goldstein

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