Quantum Mechanics and Objectivity, 1965 A Study of the Physical Philosophy of Werner Heisenberg

Quantum mechanics has raised in an acute form three problems which go to the heart of man's relationship with nature through experimental science: (r) the public objectivity of science, that is, its value as a universal science for all investigators; (2) the empirical objectivity of scientific objects, that is, man's ability to construct a precise or causal spatio-temporal model of microscopic systems; and finally (3), the formal objectivity of science, that is, its value as an expression of what nature is independently of its being an object of human knowledge. These are three aspects of what is generally called the "crisis of objec­ tivity" or the "crisis of realism" in modern physics. This crisis is. studied in the light of Werner Heisenberg's work. Heisenberg was one of the architects of quantum mechanics, and we have chosen his writings as the principal source-material for this study. Among physicists of the microscopic domain, no one except perhaps Bohr has expressed himself so abundantly and so profoundly on the philosophy of science as Heisenberg. His writings, both technical and non-technical, show an awareness of the mysterious element in scientific knowledge, far from the facile positivism of Bohr and others of his contemporaries. The mystery of human knowledge and human SUbjectivity is for him an abiding source of wonder.

I: Objectivity in Quantum Mechanics.- The Epistemological Structure of Quantum Mechanics.- One: Introduction.- Two: The Discovery of Quantum Mechanics.- Three: The Intentionality of Structure of Complementarity.- Four: Complementarity and the Scientific Method A Criticism.- Five: Subjectivity and Objectivity.- Six: Classical Mechanics and Quantum Mechanics.- II Reality in Quantum Mechanics.- The Ontological Structure of Atomic Systems.- Seven: Various Theories of Reality in Physics.- Eight: Reality in Heisenberg’s Philosophy.- Nine: Ontological Structure of Physical Reality.- III The Structure of Physical Science.- Ten: Logic and Language of Science.- Appendix: Law of Superposition of Wave Functions — Entropy and Information.- Glossary of Philosophical and Scientific Terms.