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The free will theorem of John H. Conway and Simon B. Kochen states that if we have a free will in the sense that our choices are not a function of the past, then, subject to certain assumptions, so must some elementary particles. Conway and Kochen's paper was published in Foundations of Physics in 2006. [1]
Stone's theorem on one-parameter unitary groups (functional analysis) Stone–Tukey theorem ; Stone–von Neumann theorem (functional analysis, representation theory of the Heisenberg group, quantum mechanics) Stone–Weierstrass theorem (functional analysis) Strassmann's theorem (field theory) Strong perfect graph theorem (graph theory)
In 2004, Conway and Simon B. Kochen, another Princeton mathematician, proved the free will theorem, a version of the "no hidden variables" principle of quantum mechanics. It states that given certain conditions, if an experimenter can freely decide what quantities to measure in a particular experiment, then elementary particles must be free to ...
Bell's theorem is a term encompassing a number of closely related results in physics, all of which determine that quantum mechanics is incompatible with local hidden-variable theories, given some basic assumptions about the nature of measurement.
The problem of free will has been identified in ancient Greek philosophical literature. The notion of compatibilist free will has been attributed to both Aristotle (4th century BCE) and Epictetus (1st century CE): "it was the fact that nothing hindered us from doing or choosing something that made us have control over them".
The neuroscience of free will encompasses two main fields of study: volition and agency. Volition, the study of voluntary actions, is difficult to define. [citation needed] If human actions are considered as lying along a spectrum based on conscious involvement in initiating the actions, then reflexes would be on one end, and fully voluntary actions would be on the other. [17]
Implicit in the theorem is the proposition that the determinism of classical physics is fundamentally incapable of describing quantum mechanics. Bell expanded on the theorem to provide what would become the conceptual foundation of the Bell test experiments. [citation needed]
Occam's razor has gained strong empirical support in helping to converge on better theories (see Uses section below for some examples). In the related concept of overfitting , excessively complex models are affected by statistical noise (a problem also known as the bias–variance tradeoff ), whereas simpler models may capture the underlying ...