Book Chat Series: Davis Humanities Institute 2022-23

Alyssa Ney will be speaking Febrauary 8, Wednesday from 5:30- 7:00 pm at the I-House on her book,  The World in a Wave Function. This guide provides library resources related to this book. 

Abstract from the Book: What are the ontological implications of quantum theories, that is, what do they tell us about the fundamental objects that make up our world? How should quantum theories make us reevaluate our classical conceptions of the basic constitution of material objects and ourselves? Is there fundamental quantum nonlocality? This book articulates several rival approaches to answering these questions, ultimately defending the wave function realist approach. Wave function realism is a way of interpreting quantum theories so that the central object they describe is the quantum wave function, interpreted as a field in an extremely high-dimensional space. According to this approach, the nonseparability and nonlocality we seem to find in quantum mechanics are ultimately manifestations of a more intuitive, separable, and local picture in higher dimensions.

Note about the author: Alyssa Ney joined the UC Davis Department of Philosophy in 2015. Prior to that, she taught at the University of Rochester for 10 years. She works primarily in metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of physics. She is the author of The World in the Wave Function: A Metaphysics for Quantum Physics (Oxford, 2021), Metaphysics: An Introduction (Routledge, 2014), and co-editor with David Z. Albert of The Wave Function: Essays on the Metaphysics of Quantum Mechanics (Oxford, 2013).

Note: To access these citations, copy and paste the italicized titles in the UC Library Search catalog.

Albert, David Z.  1992. Quantum Mechanics and Experience. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Albert, David Z.  1996. Elementary Quantum Metaphysics. In Bohmian Mechanics and Quantum Theory: An Appraisal. J.T. Cushing, A. Fine, and S. Goldstein, eds. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 277–284.

Albert, David Z.  2000. Time and Chance. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Albert, David Z.  2013. Wave Function Realism. The Wave Function: Essays in the Metaphysics of Quantum Mechanics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Barnes, Elizabeth.  2010. Ontic Vagueness: A Guide for the Perplexed.  Noûs. 44(4): 601–627.

Barnes, Elizabeth and J. Robert Williams. 2011. A Theory of Metaphysical Indeterminacy.  Oxford Studies in Metaphysics. 6: 103–148

Bell, John.  1976. A Theory of Local Beables.  Epistemological Letters. 9: 11–24.

Bell, John.  1989. Against ‘Measurement.’ In 62 Years of Uncertainty: Erice. New York: Plenum.

Fraser, James D.  2020. The Real Problem with Perturbative Quantum Field Theory.  British Journal for the Philosophy of Science. 71(2): 391–413.

French, Steven.  2014. The Structure of the World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Hubert, Mario and Davide Romano. 2018. The Wave-Function Is a Multi-Field.  European Journal for the Philosophy of Science. 8(3): 521–537.

Maudlin, Tim.  2019. Philosophy of Physics: Quantum Theory. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Norsen, Travis.  2010. The Theory of (Exclusively) Local Beables.  Foundations of Physics. 40(12): 1858–1884.

Ruetsche, Laura.  2011. Interpreting Quantum Theories. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Shankar, R.  2012. Principles of Quantum Mechanics, 2nd ed. Cham: Springer.

Wallace, David.  2012. The Emergent Multiverse. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Wallace, David.  2020. Against Wave Function Realism. In Current Controversies in Philosophy of Science. S. Dasgupta and B. Weslake, eds. London: Routledge.
 

Note: To access these citations, copy and paste the italicized titles in the UC Library Search catalog.

Ney, Alyssa.  2010. Are There Fundamental Intrinsic Properties? In New Waves in Metaphysics. A. Hazlett, ed. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 219–239.

Ney, Alyssa.  2012. The Status of Our Ordinary Three Dimensions in a Quantum Universe.  Noûs. 46(3): 525–560.

Ney, Alyssa.  2013. Introduction. The Wave Function: Essays in the Metaphysics of Quantum Mechanics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ney, Alyssa.  2015. Fundamental Physical Ontologies and the Constraint of Empirical Coherence: A Defense of Wave Function Realism.  Synthese. 192(10): 3105–3124.

Ney, Alyssa.  2016. Grounding in the Philosophy of Mind: A Defense. In Scientific Composition and Metaphysical Ground. K. Aizawa and C. Gillett, eds. London: Palgrave-Macmillan, 271–300.

Ney, Alyssa.  2017. Finding the World in the Wave Function: Some Strategies for Solving the Macro-object Problem.  Synthese. doi:10.1007/s11229-017-1349-4.

Ney, Alyssa.  2019. The Politics of Fundamentality. In What Is “Fundamental”?  A. Aguirre, B. Foster, and Z. Meerali, eds. Cham: Springer, 27–36.

Ney, Alyssa. 2020a. Separability, Locality, and Higher Dimensions in Quantum Mechanics.  Current Controversies in Philosophy of Science. London: Routledge, 75–90.

Ney, Alyssa. 2020b. Grounding and the Philosophy of Mind.  The Routledge Handbook of Metaphysical Grounding. London: Routledge, 460–471.

Ney, Alyssa and David Z Albert, eds. 2013. The Wave Function: Essays in the Metaphysics of Quantum Mechanics. New York: Oxford University Press.

Ney, Alyssa and Kathryn Phillips. 2013. Does an Adequate Physical Theory Demand a Primitive Ontology?  Philosophy of Science. 80: 454–474.