Originally posted by Soothfast
Hey, what's all this about? I stumbled across it by accident, but it appears to be a rather drastic reinterpretation of quantum theory. In fact it is a deterministic theory. I'm not surprised that deterministic theories are still being entertained, but this seems like a respectable effort.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Broglie–Bohm_theory
http://www.bohmian-mechanics.net
The conventional interpretation of quantum physics which is called the "Copenhagen interpretation", which, like many scientists including Einstein I should add, I think is erroneous. This is because it leads to such philosophical problems such as what is called the "measurement problem". Basically I and, even in the modern day, many scientists (although many more do not), actually reject the Copenhagen interpretation in favour of what is called the "realist interpretation" of quantum physics.
I cannot help but have the suspicion that the Copenhagen interpretation has only become the most popular one because both many scientists and the public alike liked the weirdness of its implications rather than because of any real sound rational scientific reason although I can also see how the Copenhagen interpretation could come from a naive application of Occam's razor which, although a perfectly valid principle, should be used with some caution.
It is an extremely common modern day misconception that quantum mechanics says quantum events are not determined but actually quantum mechanics doesn't specify whether quantum events are determined or not and the Copenhagen interpretation isn't the actual quantum mechanics but is rather purely a metaphysical
interpretation of quantum mechanics thus quantum mechanics doesn't specifically say/imply a realist interpretation must be wrong nor merely improbable.
The "pilot-wave theory" (in your link ) , is just one example of such a realists interpretations out of several workable realist interpretations and it happens to be the one that Einstein, rightly or wrongly, thought correct.
Although I am a "realist" meaning that I think a correct interpretation of quantum mechanics must be a realist interpretation, I personally remain uncommitted to any specific realist interpretation until if or when I know of evidence to support one over the others.
One thing that should be noted is that there couldn't ever be evidence for the Copenhagen interpretation over all possible realist interpretations because one of the characteristics of the Copenhagen interpretation is that it cannot ever be proven true even if it is true although it might be falsifiable if a realist interpretation could ever be so constructed to make a prediction that the Copenhagen interpretation doesn't make and which would be possible to prove and then empirical evidence proves it.
But what all that would mean is that, hypothetically, if the Copenhagen interpretation is the true one in reality, the debate of which interpretation is the true one will never ever go away for as long as thinking people exist who know of such interpretations.