Article ID: CBB000771890

Philosophy Enters the Optics Laboratory: Bell's Theorem and Its First Experimental Tests (1965--1982) (2006)

unapi

This paper deals with the ways that the issue of completing quantum mechanics was brought into laboratories and became a topic in mainstream quantum optics. It focuses on the period between 1965, when Bell published what we now call Bell's theorem, and 1982, when Aspect published the results of his experiments. Discussing some of those past contexts and practices, I show that factors in addition to theoretical innovations, experiments, and techniques were necessary for the flourishing of this subject, and that the experimental implications of Bell's theorem were neither suddenly recognized nor quickly highly regarded by physicists. Indeed, I will argue that what was considered good physics after Aspect's 1982 experiments was once considered by many a philosophical matter instead of a scientific one, and that the path from philosophy to physics required a change in the physics community's attitude about the status of the foundations of quantum mechanics.

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Authors & Contributors
Bernstein, Jeremy
Silva Neto, Climério Paulo da
Becker, Adam
Panoutsopoulos, Grigoris
Zemplén, Gábor Á.
Whitaker, Andrew
Concepts
Physics
Quantum mechanics
Philosophy of science
Experiments and experimentation
Controversies and disputes
Light
Time Periods
20th century, late
20th century
21st century
19th century
17th century
Places
Copenhagen (Denmark)
Northern Ireland
Institutions
European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)
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