Many-Worlds and the Uncertainty Principle

Date: Sun, 21 Jan 1996 21:31:01 -0800
From: Tony Smith <fsmith@aip.org>
To: quantum-d@teleport.com
Subject: QUANTUM-D: Many-Worlds and the Uncertainty Principle

Here is something that Michael Gibbs and I have been working 
on about Many-Worlds and the uncertainty principle...

Tony  21 Jan 96

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Many-Worlds and the Uncertainty Principle: 

Does anybody know of any text-book reference or 
published article dealing dealing with the following 
approach to the Uncertainty Principle based on the 
Many-Worlds viewpoint? 


Do NOT (as is conventional) say that a particle is 
sort of "spread out" around a given location in a given space-time  

                      |
                      x
                     xxx
                   xxxxxxx
              xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

due to "quantum uncertainty".  

Instead, say that the particle is really at a point in space-time

                      |
                      x

BUT that the "uncertainty spread" is not a property of the 
particle, but is due to dynamics of the space-time, 
in which particle-antiparticle pairs x-o are being created
sort of at random.  For example, in one of the Many-Worlds,
the spacetime might not be just 

                      |

but would have created a particle-antiparticle pair

                      |
                x - o 

If the original particle is where we put it to start with, 
then in this World we would have 

                      |
                x - o x 

Now, if the new o annihilates the original x, 
we would have 

                      |
                x       
                      
and, since the particles x are indistinguishable from each other, 
it would APPEAR that the original particle x was at a different 
location, and the probabilities of such appearances would 
look like the conventional uncertainty in position.  


My apologies for the crude illustration and description, 
but I hope it gets the idea across.