Noncommuting common causes revisited

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Hofer-Szabó, Gábor, Szalay, Szilárd
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Hofer-Szabó, Gábor
Szalay, Szilárd
author_facet Hofer-Szabó, Gábor
Szalay, Szilárd
contents In this paper, we revisit the concept of noncommuting common causes; refute two objections raised against them, the triviality objection and the lack of causal explanatory force; and explore how their existence modifies the EPR argument. More specifically, we show that 1) product states screening off all quantum correlations do not compromise noncommuting common causal explanations; 2) noncommuting common causes can satisfy the law of total probability; 3) perfect correlations can have indeterministic noncommuting common causes; and, as a combination of the above claims, 4) perfect correlations can have noncommuting common causes which are both nontrivial and satisfy the law of total probability.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2411_05468
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Noncommuting common causes revisited
Hofer-Szabó, Gábor
Szalay, Szilárd
Quantum Physics
Mathematical Physics
History and Philosophy of Physics
In this paper, we revisit the concept of noncommuting common causes; refute two objections raised against them, the triviality objection and the lack of causal explanatory force; and explore how their existence modifies the EPR argument. More specifically, we show that 1) product states screening off all quantum correlations do not compromise noncommuting common causal explanations; 2) noncommuting common causes can satisfy the law of total probability; 3) perfect correlations can have indeterministic noncommuting common causes; and, as a combination of the above claims, 4) perfect correlations can have noncommuting common causes which are both nontrivial and satisfy the law of total probability.
title Noncommuting common causes revisited
topic Quantum Physics
Mathematical Physics
History and Philosophy of Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.05468