Schrodinger's Rabbits: The Many Worlds of Quantum

By Colin Bruce

Book Overview

For the better part of a century, attempts to explain what was really going on in the quantum world seemed doomed to failure. But recent technological advances have made the question both practical and urgent. A brilliantly imaginative group of physicists at Oxford University have risen to the challenge. This is their story.

At long last, there is a sensible way to think about quantum mechanics. The new view abolishes the need to believe in randomness, long-range spooky forces, or conscious observers with mysterious powers to collapse cats into a state of life or death. But the new understanding comes at a price: we must accept that we live in a multiverse wherein countless versions of reality unfold side-by-side. The philosophical and personal consequences of this are awe-inspiring.

The new interpretation has allowed imaginative physicists to conceive of wonderful new technologies: measuring devices that effectively share information between worlds and computers that can borrow the power of other worlds to perform calculations. Step by step, the problems initially associated with the original many-worlds formulation have been addressed and answered so that a clear but startling new picture has emerged.

Just as Copenhagen was the centre of quantum discussion a lifetime ago, so Oxford has been the epicenter of the modern debate, with such figures as Roger Penrose and Anton Zeilinger fighting for single-world views, and David Deutsch, Lev Vaidman and a host of others for many-worlds.

An independent physicist living in Oxford, Bruce has had a ringside seat to the debate. In his capable hands, we understand why the initially fantastic sounding many-worlds view is not only a useful way to look at things, but logically compelling. Parallel worlds are as real as the distant galaxies detected by the Hubble Space Telescope, even though the evidence for their existence may consist only of a few photons.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0309090512
• ISBN13: 9780309090513
• Release Date: October 2004
• Publisher: Joseph Henry Press
• Length: 282 Pages
• Weight: 0.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Best book since Douglas Adams

This is without a doubt the one book since Douglas Adams stopped writing that made me glad English was my native language.

All The Myriad Explanations

Every few years I look for a good book to bring me up to date on the latest musings of the quantum mechanics to see if they've figured things out yet and Colin Bruce's Schrödinger's Rabbits admirably filled the bill. Bruce does the obligatory opening chapters on quantum mechanics in general and the weirdness that arises when mere humans [like me] try to fathom the subject. The book then launches into a thorough accounting of what the author refers to as the Oxford interpretation, giving us the agreements and disagreements, warts and all. Bruce is a great writer and keeps the tough material engaging. I should confess that I'm a very willing participant and have been fascinated with the many worlds interpretation ever since I read the Larry Niven short stories All The Myriad Ways and For A Foggy Night. I highly recommend Schrödinger's Rabbits to anyone interested in quantum mechanics.

An exposition and defense of the many-worlds interpretation

First, let me say that I was both surprised and gratified to learn that this book was written in a world in which I won the Fields medal rather than the Nevanlinna prize. Second, the first few chapters of this book comprise one of the best and most entertaining expositions I've seen on the weirdnesses of quantum mechanics. The sections on the many-worlds interpretation (or interpretations, since not all many-worlders agree) of quantum mechanics are very good, although they haven't changed my views. (I'm still firmly agnostic about the interpretation of quantum mechanics.) This book explains the two most mainstream interpretations of quantum mechanics quite clearly, and compares them reasonably fairly. The main disappointment I had in the book was its treatment of Bohm's and other alternative interpretations of quantum mechanics (i.e., not Copenhagen or many-worlds). They are dismissed quite cavalierly, and I would have liked to see them treated more seriously and at greater length, and dismissed with better justifications. (Just to set the record straight, let me say that I think there are good reasons to dismiss Bohm's interpretation and excellent reasons for dismissing all the other alternative interpretations. It's fairly hard to articulate these reasons, as doing it right would involve learning more than I really want to about these alternative interpretations, and I would have really liked Colin Bruce to do this work for me. On the other hand, maybe I'm just being selfish here and hoping somebody else will do work that I'm too lazy to do myself. Even without a comprehensive treatment of these other interpretations, this is a really entertaining and instructive book, which deserves every one of the five stars I'm giving it.)