Entanglement and the Path Integral

Abstract

The path integral is not typically utilized for analyzing entanglement experiments, in part because there is no standard toolbox for converting an arbitrary experiment into a form allowing a simple sum-over-history calculation. After completing the last portion of this toolbox (a technique for implementing multi-particle measurements in an entangled basis), some interesting 4- and 6-particle experiments are analyzed with this alternate technique. While the joint probabilities of measurement outcomes are always equivalent to conventional quantum mechanics, differences in the calculations motivate a number of foundational insights, concerning nonlocality, retrocausality, and the objectivity of entanglement itself.

arXiv comment23 pages, 6 figures, comments welcome

References in corpus (18)

• Experimental loophole-free violation of a Bell inequality using entangled electron spins separated by 1.3 km
• Experimental delayed-choice entanglement swapping
• Bell nonlocality in networks
• Genuine quantum nonlocality in the triangle network
• Delayed choice for entanglement swapping
• Bell's Theorem and Locally-Mediated Reformulations of Quantum Mechanics
• Deterministic entanglement swapping in a superconducting circuit
• Quantum entanglement in the triangle network
• Laws of Nature as Constraints
• A New Class of Retrocausal Models
• Quantum States as Ordinary Information
• Time-symmetric boundary conditions and quantum foundations
• Action Duality: A Constructive Principle for Quantum Foundations
• Towards a realistic parsing of the Feynman path integral
• Entanglement Swapping and Action at a Distance
• Contextuality, Fine-Tuning, and Teleological Explanation
• Probabilities and certainties within a causally symmetric model
• Spacetime Path Integrals for Entangled States