The quantum formalism is a "measurement" formalism--a phenomenological formalism describing certain macroscopic regularities. We argue that it can be regarded, and best be understood, as arising from Bohmian mechanics, which is what emerges from Schr6dinger's equation for a system of particles when we merely insist that "particles " means particles. While distinctly non-Newtonian, Bohmian mechanics is a fully deterministic theory of particles in motion, a motion choreographed by the wave function. We find that a Bohmian universe, though deterministic, evolves in such a manner that an appearance of randomness emerges, precisely as described by the quantum formalism and given, for example, by "p = IV [ 2.,, A crucial ingredient in our analysis of the origin of this randomness is the notion of the effective wave function of a subsystem, a notion of interest in its own right and of relevance to any discussion of quantum theory. When the quantum formalism is regarded as arising in this way, the paradoxes and perplexities so often associated with (nonrelativistic) quantum theory simply evaporate.

In order to arrive at Bohmian mechanics from standard nonrelativistic quantum mechanics one need do almost nothing! One need only complete the usual quantum description in what is really the most obvious way: by simply including the positions of the particles of a quantum system as part of the state description of that system, allowing these positions to evolve in the most natural way. The entire quantum formalism, including the uncertainty principle and quantum randomness, emerges from an analysis of this evolution. This can be expressed succinctly—though in fact not succinctly enough—by declaring that the essential innovation of Bohmian mechanics is the insight that particles move! 1 Bohmian Mechanics is Minimal Is it not clear from the smallness of the scintillation on the screen that we have to do with a particle? And is it not clear, from the diffraction and interference 1 patterns, that the motion of the particle is directed by a wave? De Broglie showed in detail how the motion of a particle, passing through just one of two holes in screen, could be influenced by waves propagating through both holes.

This thesis introduces the language QML, a functional language for quantum computations on finite types. QML exhibits quantum data and control structures, and integrates reversible and irreversible quantum computations. The design of QML is guided by the categorical semantics: QML programs are in-terpreted by morphisms in the category FQC of finite quantum computations, which provides a constructive operational semantics of irreversible quantum computations, realisable as quantum circuits. The quantum circuit model is also given a formal categorical definition via the category FQC. QML integrates reversible and irreversible quantum computations in one language, using first order strict linear logic to make weakenings, which may lead to the collapse of the quantum wavefunction, explicit. Strict programs are free from measurement, and hence preserve superpositions and entanglement. A denotational semantics of QML programs is presented, which maps QML terms

We consider game theory from the perspective of quantum algorithms. Strategies in classical game theory are either pure (deterministic) or mixed (probabilistic). While not every two-person zero-sum finite game has an equilibrium in the set of pure strategies, von Neumann showed that there is always an equilibrium at which each player follows a mixed strategy. A mixed strategy deviating from the equilibrium strategy cannot increase a player's expected payoff. We show by example, however, that a player who implements a quantum strategy can increase his expected payoff, and explain the relation to efficient quantum algorithms. 1998 Physics and Astronomy Classification Scheme: 03.67.-a, 03.67.Lx, 02.50.Le. American Mathematical Society Subject Classification: 81P15, 90D05. Journal of Economic Literature Classification System: C72. Key Words: quantum computation; game theory. Quantum strategies David A. Meyer Attention to the physical representation of information underlies the recent t...

Bohmian mechanics is the most naively obvious embedding imaginable of Schrödinger’s equation into a completely coherent physical theory. It describes a world in which particles move in a highly non-Newtonian sort of way, one which may at first appear to have little to do with the spectrum of predictions of quantum mechanics. It turns out, however, that as a consequence of the defining dynamical equations of Bohmian mechanics, when a system has wave function ψ its configuration is typically random, with probability density ρ given by |ψ | 2, the quantum equilibrium distribution. It also turns out that the entire quantum formalism, operators as observables and all the rest, naturally emerges in Bohmian mechanics from the analysis of “measurements. ” This analysis reveals the status of operators as observables in the description of quantum phenomena, and facilitates a clear view of the range of applicability of the usual quantum mechanical formulas. Dedicated to Elliott Lieb on the occasion of his 70th birthday. Elliott will be (we fear unpleasantly) surprised to learn that he bears a greater responsibility for this paper than he could possibly imagine. We would of course like to think that our work addresses in some way the concern suggested by the title of his recent talks, The

Although entanglement is widely considered to be necessary for quantum algorithms to improve on classical ones, Lloyd has observed recently that Grover's quantum search algorithm can be implemented without entanglement, by replacing multiple particles with a single particle having exponentially many states. We explain that this maneuver removes entanglement from any quantum algorithm. But all physical resources must be accounted for to quantify algorithm complexity, and this scheme typically incurs exponential costs in some other resource(s). In particular, we demonstrate that a recent experimental realization requires exponentially increasing precision. There is, however, a quantum algorithm which searches a `sophisticated' database (not unlike a Web search engine) with a single query, but which we show does not require entanglement even for multiparticle implementations. 1999 Physics and Astronomy Classification Scheme: 03.67.Lx, 32.80.Rm. 2000 American Mathematical Society Subject ...

The roles of decoherence and environment-induced superselection in the emergence of the classical from the quantum substrate are described. The stability of correlations between the einselected quantum pointer states and the environment allows them to exist almost as objectively as classical states were once thought to exist: there are ways of finding out what is the pointer state of the system which uses redundancy of its correlations with the environment, and which leave einselected states essentially unperturbed. This relatively objective existence of certain quantum states facilitates operational definition of probabilities in the quantum setting. Moreover, once there are states that ‘exist ’ and can be ‘found out’, a ‘collapse ’ in the traditional sense is no longer necessary—in effect, it has already happened. The role of the preferred states in the processing and storage of information is emphasized. The existential interpretation based on the relatively objective existence of stable correlations between the einselected states of observers ’ memory and in the outside universe is formulated and discussed.

We define a polynomial measure of multiparticle entanglement which is scalable, i.e., which applies to any number of spin-1 2 particles. By evaluating it for three particle states, for eigenstates of the one dimensional Heisenberg antiferromagnet and on quantum error correcting code subspaces, we illustrate the extent to which it quantifies global entanglement. We also apply it to track the evolution of entanglement during a quantum computation.

A common problem when writing compilers for programming languages or little, domain-specific...

Quantum theory has provoked intense discussions about its interpretation since its pioneer days, beginning with Bohr’s view of quantum theory as a theory of knowledge. We show that such an epistemic perspective can be consistently complemented by Einstein’s ontically oriented position.