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Dear SPF friends:

To resolve their scientific differences in person rather than on internet forums, Joy Christian and Richard Gill are planning a public symposium at Leiden University (Netherlands) centred on a presentation by Christian of his work. I will moderate debate between Gill and Christian, who each asked me to privately mediate between them in this undertaking. The symposium will also include invited talks by other Bell critics and Bell supporters, panel discussions and moderated open debate.

I appreciate the trust and confidence that both Richard and Joy have placed in me to mediate forward progress toward this symposium. One of my objectives is to help resolve years of internet debate between two of my friends, and their networks. But I see the broader goal, as always, to be advancing science. And in this case, we are looking to clarify and hopefully resolve some of the deepest and most perplexing issues regarding the true nature of quantum mechanical physical reality, in person, rather than over the internet.

As we settle on dates and more details, we will of course let people know through this and other topical internet forums.

Best regards to all,

Jay

***
Thank you, Jay. Your help in mediating toward the symposium is much appreciated. Thank you for your time and effort. Best, Joy

***

It is great that you are doing this, Jay. Thank you.

Thanks Jay, Fred, and Joy! I'm back on Fred's wonderful forum - as long as I behave myself, obviously.

We (=Jay, Joy and myself) are still working hard on the symposium. A new idea has been to hold it not in Leiden, but perhaps in Groningen, if Hans de Raedt would be interested in being the local host. I am very likely seeing Hans in less than a month in Växjö. But I hope to email him about the idea, as soon as possible.

The idea for the new location came from Ilija Barukčić, another well known anti-Bell researcher, who lives not far from Hamburg in North Germany. He too has an apple to pick with me. Groningen is mid way between Leiden and Hamburg. And also, importantly, still not far from Oxford.

Ilija has written an extraordinary book on "causality" which at the moment is a very very hot topic in machine learning, AI, big data, data science ... And naturally he applies his ideas on causality to quantum mechanics.

Groningen is a wonderful old university town and gateway to perhaps the most amazing part of the Netherlands, the "Waddenzee" (the water between mainland and string of islands at the top). The string of islands continues along the North German coast, past Schleswig Holstein, and on, almost all the way along the Danish coast to the Northernmost tip of Jutland.

Yes, this symposium should be quite interesting.

I am still quite amazed that mathematicians and others, but especially mathematicians, can believe in Bell's junk physics theory when it is mathematically impossible for anything to violate the inequalities.

So what is the trick that QM can seemingly violate the inequalities? It is quite simple; they use a different inequality with a higher bound. Some subtle cheating going on there.

Using a different inequality with a higher bound would not be subtle.

If there is a trick, it is a great deal more subtle.

Actually my own pretty firm belief at the moment (which I hope to further develop at the symposium) is that spooky *passion* at a distance does exist [there is no *action* at a distance]. The only thing wrong with it is the word "spooky" which makes it sound weird, unsound, creepy, dangerous. Well:" I don't think it *is* creepy or dangerous (well - no more creepy or dangerous than mathematics or nuclear power). I think that due to limitations on our brains which evolution herself did not find useful to transcend, we cannot "understand" quantum mechanics and never will. (Evolution *could* have helped us understand quantum mechanics - all that was needed was a quantum brain instead of a classical brain).

We can just use the math to calculate the right answer (or at least: answers which are as accurate as we could possibly dream of, at the moment). The maths makes no sense yet the answer seems to be right.

I wonder if "wonderful passion at a distance" wouldn't be a better name. Or "mysterious passion at a distance". But I don't think those phrases will bring in the research grant money. Any suggestions?

gill1109 wrote:Using a different inequality with a higher bound would not be subtle.

If there is a trick, it is a great deal more subtle.

Please demonstrate mathematically how QM supposedly "violates" an inequality that is mathematically impossible to violate. Sounds like nonsense, doesn't it? That is because it is.

FrediFizzx wrote:

gill1109 wrote:Using a different inequality with a higher bound would not be subtle.

If there is a trick, it is a great deal more subtle.

Please demonstrate mathematically how QM supposedly "violates" an inequality that is mathematically impossible to violate. Sounds like nonsense, doesn't it? That is because it is.

Well, I will just cut to the chase here and demonstrate the trick myself. It is pretty easy to follow. So we have the original Bell inequality,



Now suppose that a is 90 degrees to b and c is in the middle at 45 degrees to both. So quantum mechanics gives |0 + 0.707| + 0.707 = 1.41 which is certainly greater than 1 so it seemingly violates the inequality.

But wait a minute! What they don't tell you is that a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time! So the quantum mechanics calculation is actually,



Which is easy to demonstrate. |(-1) - (+1)| -(-1) = 3 and 1.41 is certainly not greater than 3 so no actual violation. So what happened here? Since a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time, the interdependency was lost that Bell setup in the original inequality. It is that simple. It is mathematically impossible for anything to violate the original inequality. So the trick is indeed subtle.

Now, I suppose we will have some bizarre rationalization as to why the above is wrong.
.

gill1109 wrote:Thanks Jay, Fred, and Joy! I'm back on Fred's wonderful forum - as long as I behave myself, obviously.

We (=Jay, Joy and myself) are still working hard on the symposium. A new idea has been to hold it not in Leiden, but perhaps in Groningen, if Hans de Raedt would be interested in being the local host. I am very likely seeing Hans in less than a month in Växjö. But I hope to email him about the idea, as soon as possible.

The idea for the new location came from Ilija Barukčić, another well known anti-Bell researcher, who lives not far from Hamburg in North Germany. He too has an apple to pick with me. Groningen is mid way between Leiden and Hamburg. And also, importantly, still not far from Oxford.

Ilija has written an extraordinary book on "causality" which at the moment is a very very hot topic in machine learning, AI, big data, data science ... And naturally he applies his ideas on causality to quantum mechanics.

Groningen is a wonderful old university town and gateway to perhaps the most amazing part of the Netherlands, the "Waddenzee" (the water between mainland and string of islands at the top). The string of islands continues along the North German coast, past Schleswig Holstein, and on, almost all the way along the Danish coast to the Northernmost tip of Jutland.

Those are all great ideas, and I am happy to see that we are making forward progress for the symposium. Realistically, it seems that this will happen in the early part of 2020.

Given my role as mediator / moderator, I have for the moment placed my own research on the fermion masses, weak mixing angles and beta decay onto a side burner (latest posts on that are at viewtopic.php?f=6&t=369 and viewtopic.php?f=6&t=372), and have instead been working on my own analysis of the EPR/Bell strong correlations based on the use of Pauli spin matrices and various understandings and interpretations provided by the theoretical framework of quantum mechanics. And I plan to present this analysis in my own paper contribution in advance of the symposium. Specifically:

Joy Christian has made extensive use of Geometric Algebra (GA) to present his theory of strong correlations. But if one adopts an extended view of Einstein's principle of general coordinate invariance and views GA as one mathematical "language" used to describe the natural world and specifically the strong correlations, then nature ought to be invariant with respect to the language we use to describe her. And, the language of Pauli matrices and eigenvectors and eigenstates and quantum mechanics often used for this purpose is, IMHO, merely another language used to describe and explain these strong correlations.

Moreover, just as there are definite "transformations" we use to translate from language to language and coordinate transformations from one coordinate system to another, so too there must be a set of "transformations" which map from GA to other languages, and specifically between GA and QM. So, I am using the Pauli spin operators and associated mathematics and quantum mechanical understandings as my "language," while looking at various key junctures of development for the mappings with GA. As it turns out, there are places where the QM language sheds better light on issues which are less well-highlighted by GA, and places where GA sheds better light on issues that are less well-highlighted by QM. But the natural world does not care which language we use, so assuming that both GA and Pauli-basis QM are both valid languages (which is an assumption also to be reviewed), the underlying reality we learn about will be the same no matter which language we use. For example, if he credit both languages with validity, then it should be readily apparent that it is absurd on its face to say that nature is local and realistic and has hidden variables when described in in GA, but that nature is not local / realistic and cannot have any hidden variables when described with Pauli-basis QM. Nature is invariant under the language we use to describe her! Period!!!

Together, with mappings between both languages, I believe a deeper understanding of the strong correlations can be obtained, and that we can get past the scientific logjam that presently exists between camps split rather vocally between Bell adherents and Bell critics. I plan to approach this as scientifically and objectively as every fiber of my being allows be to do, without predisposition toward either camp. I am neither trying to prove nor disprove Bell, nor prove nor disprove Christian. I am trying to clearly and deeply penetrate the Pauli-basis QM mathematics, transparently identify and apply the interpretations and understandings routinely used, point out matters which may be unrecognized and overlooked, and let the mathematics and natural world itself guide the conclusions.

I am running drafts of this by both Joy Christian / Fred Diether, and Richard Gill, in the hope of emerging with an agreement from at least the four of of us that what I am preparing is correct, or at free of error and clear contradiction. In the near future I plan to also post drafts here to widen the net of input and review.

Best to all,

Jay

FrediFizzx wrote:

FrediFizzx wrote:

gill1109 wrote:Using a different inequality with a higher bound would not be subtle.

If there is a trick, it is a great deal more subtle.

Please demonstrate mathematically how QM supposedly "violates" an inequality that is mathematically impossible to violate. Sounds like nonsense, doesn't it? That is because it is.

Well, I will just cut to the chase here and demonstrate the trick myself. It is pretty easy to follow. So we have the original Bell inequality,



Now suppose that a is 90 degrees to b and c is in the middle at 45 degrees to both. So quantum mechanics gives |0 + 0.707| + 0.707 = 1.41 which is certainly greater than 1 so it seemingly violates the inequality.

But wait a minute! What they don't tell you is that a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time! So the quantum mechanics calculation is actually,



Which is easy to demonstrate. |(-1) - (+1)| -(-1) = 3 and 1.41 is certainly not greater than 3 so no actual violation. So what happened here? Since a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time, the interdependency was lost that Bell setup in the original inequality. It is that simple. It is mathematically impossible for anything to violate the original inequality. So the trick is indeed subtle.

Now, I suppose we will have some bizarre rationalization as to why the above is wrong.
.

It is easy to demonstrate that the same interdependency is lost in the CHSH version of the inequalities also. a, a', b, and b' can't all happen at the same time so the upper bound for quantum mechanics is 4 not 2.
.

FrediFizzx wrote:

FrediFizzx wrote:

gill1109 wrote:Using a different inequality with a higher bound would not be subtle.

If there is a trick, it is a great deal more subtle.

Please demonstrate mathematically how QM supposedly "violates" an inequality that is mathematically impossible to violate. Sounds like nonsense, doesn't it? That is because it is.

Well, I will just cut to the chase here and demonstrate the trick myself. It is pretty easy to follow. So we have the original Bell inequality,



Now suppose that a is 90 degrees to b and c is in the middle at 45 degrees to both. So quantum mechanics gives |0 + 0.707| + 0.707 = 1.41 which is certainly greater than 1 so it seemingly violates the inequality.

But wait a minute! What they don't tell you is that a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time! So the quantum mechanics calculation is actually,



Which is easy to demonstrate. |(-1) - (+1)| -(-1) = 3 and 1.41 is certainly not greater than 3 so no actual violation. So what happened here? Since a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time, the interdependency was lost that Bell setup in the original inequality. It is that simple. It is mathematically impossible for anything to violate the original inequality. So the trick is indeed subtle.

Now, I suppose we will have some bizarre rationalization as to why the above is wrong.
.

Hm. It's not wrong. It's irrelevant. You need to carefully study the conditions which Bell (temporarily) made in order to derive that inequality. He was doing an argument by contradiction. His aim was not to derive the inequality, but to show that one or more of the assumptions which he made, in order to derive the inequality, must be wrong. Non mathematicians can never fathom how it is possible to prove something by proving the opposite! Sorry - I never yet met a physicists who understood "proof by contradiction". I grant you that physicists are extremely clever people, much cleverer than mathematicians, and able to do calculations and get the right answer which the mathematicians don't even think are allowed. Gerard 't Hooft followed a maths course on measure theory, hoping to learn how to integrate more functions than he already knew how to integrate. They taught him that he couldn't or shouldn't (it wasn't made clear) even integrate most of the functions which he could already do, perfectly well. Since then he despised all mathematicians. What he thought of statistician, heavens knows. I guess they were totally below his radar. Some low life form which you can happily tread on, from time to time, without noticing.

gill1109 wrote:

FrediFizzx wrote:

FrediFizzx wrote:Please demonstrate mathematically how QM supposedly "violates" an inequality that is mathematically impossible to violate. Sounds like nonsense, doesn't it? That is because it is.

Well, I will just cut to the chase here and demonstrate the trick myself. It is pretty easy to follow. So we have the original Bell inequality,



Now suppose that a is 90 degrees to b and c is in the middle at 45 degrees to both. So quantum mechanics gives |0 + 0.707| + 0.707 = 1.41 which is certainly greater than 1 so it seemingly violates the inequality.

But wait a minute! What they don't tell you is that a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time! So the quantum mechanics calculation is actually,



Which is easy to demonstrate. |(-1) - (+1)| -(-1) = 3 and 1.41 is certainly not greater than 3 so no actual violation. So what happened here? Since a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time, the interdependency was lost that Bell setup in the original inequality. It is that simple. It is mathematically impossible for anything to violate the original inequality. So the trick is indeed subtle.

Now, I suppose we will have some bizarre rationalization as to why the above is wrong.
.

Hm. It's not wrong. It's irrelevant. ...

You are deflecting as usual. It is completely relevant. It is Bell's inequalities that are irrelevant because it is mathematically impossible for anything to violate them as demonstrated above by the "trick". Neither QM nor the quantum experiments ever violate Bell's inequalities. It's mathematically impossible. It is quite amazing that someone like yourself in the math field doesn't even realize that.
.

So now that we know the "trick" and that nothing ever actually violates Bell's inequalities, what do those inequalities actually tell us? They simply tell us that there is a certain bound if the interdependencies can be maintained. Supposedly in a deterministic model, you can make suppositions about unmeasured quantities but that doesn't really completely describe Nature. Certainly not for the indeterministic model Bell had in mind for the inequalities, EPR-Bohm. There is no getting around the fact that the spin 1/2 particles are going to be 50-50 spin up or down at the detectors. That is the best prediction any model whether classical or quantum can make. Of course we have the quantum correlation prediction but that prediction can also be done classically very easily. So bottom line; Bell inequalities tell us really nothing about that.

Hm... Bell gave a lengthy *physical* argument, following up on EPR and EPR-B, why, even though it might be impossible to measure a, b and c simultaneously, still it made sense to imagine that the outcomes of measuring a or b or c were simultaneously “predefined” as they were, in those particles. That’s why we call them “hidden variables”. Obviously they should be “local” as well. I think the EPR argument is pretty water-tight. If “local realism”, more or less synonymous with “local hidden variables”, is true, then quantum mechanics is incomplete. Bell just refined the EPR argument a tiny way, making use of a trivial probability result due to Boole, and since rediscovered a myriad times in many fields of science (econometrics - they call it instrumental variables; epidemiology and medical statistics - it’s their methodology for dealing with noncompliance, and with non-randomised clinical trials). Mathematically the result is indeed, as Fred says, 1+1+1=3. I hope everyone agrees with that.

FrediFizzx wrote:Well, I will just cut to the chase here and demonstrate the trick myself. It is pretty easy to follow. So we have the original Bell inequality,



Now suppose that a is 90 degrees to b and c is in the middle at 45 degrees to both. So quantum mechanics gives |0 + 0.707| + 0.707 = 1.41 which is certainly greater than 1 so it seemingly violates the inequality.

But wait a minute! What they don't tell you is that a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time! So the quantum mechanics calculation is actually,



Which is easy to demonstrate. |(-1) - (+1)| -(-1) = 3 and 1.41 is certainly not greater than 3 so no actual violation. So what happened here? Since a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time, the interdependency was lost that Bell setup in the original inequality. It is that simple. It is mathematically impossible for anything to violate the original inequality. So the trick is indeed subtle.

This was my initial objection too, when I first encountered Bell's theorem many, many years ago. I guess we've all been there.

However, I realized that the objection was so trivial that there must surely be something I had overlooked, else the theorem would never have survived the scrutiny it has received over the years. And indeed there was.

Maybe Joy Christian and Fred Diether would both care to comment on the EPR argument. Einstein argues, using predictions of quantum mechanics, that position and momentum are *both* defined on *both* of a pair of entangled particles. This leads Einstein to say (assuming that QM predictions are indeed correct) that both particles both have a position and momentum and that in a local hidden variables theory both are defined even if we can only measure one of the two on each of the two particles.

If you prefer the simplicity of the discrete variables, just run through the same argument for a pair of spin half particles in the singlet state. Each of the particles could have its spin measured either in the x direction or in the y direction. If either particle is measured in one direction, one knows with certainty what the outcome would be of the same measurement on the other particle. So *both* the particles have a well definied spin in *both* x and y directions, whether or not either or both are measured, and however either is measured. Measurement of either x or y spin of either particle simply reveals the preexisting spin (up or down) of the particle in question in the direction in which it has been measured.

And there *is* a perfectly adequate local hidden variables model for the spin measurement of both particles in the x and the y directions. I know this, because of Fine's refinement of Bell's theorem. The 8 CHSH inequalities are *necessary and sufficient* for existence of a LHV model in the case of two parties, two measurements per party, two outcomes per measurement. The model matches exactly QM predictions. So in particular, it says that either measurement of either particle is equally likely to give a "spin up" or a "spin down" outcome. The model predicts precisely the correlations which are actually observed. The two outcomes are independent when they are measured in perpendicular directions; they are perfectly correlated or perfectly anti-correlated if they are measured in the same direction.

Yet QM says, and experimenters agree, that you can't measure spin in both x and y directions on the same particle. But we have argued, following Einstein and Bohm, and following standard, uncontroversial calculations from QM (which match perfectly to what we see in experiments) that both particles have both spins, predefined, carried, presumably, from the source to the two particles. Fine's refinement of Bell's theorem is just a simple piece of elementary algebra. It doesn't matter whether we are talking about spin measurements on electrons, or something completely different. There is no quantum mechanics in Fine's theorem.

We can indeed easily write down a simple local hidden variables model for this set-up.

If Einstein's arguments in this situation are correct, do not lead to any problems, and do show that each particle does have a predetermined spin in each possibly chosen measurement direction, then it seems to me that the arguments which Fred just gave are incorrect. And contradict, moreover, Christian's own construction of a LHV model (since Christian does not "cheat" in any way). He doesn't exploit any well known loopholes' he exploits no loophole at all. He has a counterexample to the pure mathematical Bell's theorem. The purely mathematical theorem is pure mathematics: we think it talks about particles, spin, angles in space .... but one can change all these words for anything else you like, and the mathematics is still applicable. ]

e.g. consider two cows in adjacent fields; one can be milked by either Athena or Beatrice; the other either by Casper or Dorothy. The milk they get out of the cow is either fresh and delicious for a day or two, or it almost immediately goes sour. Etc etc. Of course, the two cows, Xanthippe and Yvonne, can only each be milked by one milk-maid. Yet it seems to make sense that the quality of the milk that either cow would produce, when milked by either milkmaid, is actually a deterministic function of a number of variables which might vary from day to day, including which milk-maid is doing the job. But the milk got by Athena from Xanthippe, on a particular day, can hardly depend on whether Casper or Dorothy milks Yvonne. Obviously, the milk qualities can be statistically dependent because the milk of both cows when milked by either milk-maid obviously can depend on the same "hidden variables" or on highly correlated hidden variables. e.g. the weather in the two fields, whether the milk-maids washed their hands or not, which girl friend went to bed with which boy friend the night before, and so on.

Heinera wrote:

FrediFizzx wrote:Well, I will just cut to the chase here and demonstrate the trick myself. It is pretty easy to follow. So we have the original Bell inequality,



Now suppose that a is 90 degrees to b and c is in the middle at 45 degrees to both. So quantum mechanics gives |0 + 0.707| + 0.707 = 1.41 which is certainly greater than 1 so it seemingly violates the inequality.

But wait a minute! What they don't tell you is that a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time! So the quantum mechanics calculation is actually,



Which is easy to demonstrate. |(-1) - (+1)| -(-1) = 3 and 1.41 is certainly not greater than 3 so no actual violation. So what happened here? Since a, b, and c can't happen all at the same time, the interdependency was lost that Bell setup in the original inequality. It is that simple. It is mathematically impossible for anything to violate the original inequality. So the trick is indeed subtle.

This was my initial objection too, when I first encountered Bell's theorem many, many years ago. I guess we've all been there.

However, I realized that the objection was so trivial that there must surely be something I had overlooked, else the theorem would never have survived the scrutiny it has received over the years. And indeed there was.

Well... what is it that you overlooked? Why didn't you mention that? Can't really be anything serious as there is no way of getting around the fact that there is some cheatin' going on when it is said that QM or the experiments violate Bell's inequalities. Once more... IT IS MATHEMATICALLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR ANYTHING TO VIOLATE BELL'S INEQUALITIES!
.

gill1109 wrote:Maybe Joy Christian and Fred Diether would both care to comment on the EPR argument. Einstein argues, using predictions of quantum mechanics, that position and momentum are *both* defined on *both* of a pair of entangled particles. This leads Einstein to say (assuming that QM predictions are indeed correct) that both particles both have a position and momentum and that in a local hidden variables theory both are defined even if we can only measure one of the two on each of the two particles. …(snip)…

Look, if you have an argument about how to get around the cheatin' of the claims that QM or the experiments can violate the inequalities, please present it. But you can't because IT IS MATHEMATICALLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR ANYTHING TO VIOLATE BELL'S INEQUALITIES! That should be... Enough Said! Bell's junk physics theory is dead from that simple fact.
.

Umm... Fred, I know you said "enough said". But: Bell's inequalities have been violated in experiments, and it is even more easy to violate them with data which you make up out of your head. Or you can use a computer. After all, I think you have written computer programs yourself to do the job.

So I think there is a problem of terminology here. Bell's inequalities are the ones in Bell's writings, Fred's inequalities are the ones in his writings. They're obviously different. So Bell's physics may well be junk physics, but the above mentioned "simple fact" can't possibly be the reason.

Sure there is a problem with terminology. We need to work it out and come up with some good, new, terminology. Isn't that exactly what such a forum is good for? To come up with terminology which we can all agree with. It may take a long time - just look at North Macedonia.

FrediFizzx wrote: Once more... IT IS MATHEMATICALLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR ANYTHING TO VIOLATE BELL'S INEQUALITIES!

But this statement makes no sense in the current context.

Assume I have a theory that the value for a particular observable is the result of a throw of a regular die. Then I can deduce the inequality . If "nothing can violate" this inequality, does that mean there are no numbers larger than 6?

Obviously not. It just means that if we observe a value for that is larger than 6, my die theory is falsified. There must be something else than a die throw that generates the observable.

You seem to not understand that Bell's inequality (or rather, Bell's upper bound) is derived under several assumptions. A violation simply means that one or more of those assumptions has to go.