Reply to: Quantum mechanical rules for observed observers and the consistency of quantum theory
Bibliographic record
Abstract
In 1967, Eugene Wigner proposed a thought experiment to test the range of validity of quantum theory 1 . The experiment features two agents, Wigner and his friend, whom we call Alice (Fig. 1 ). Alice works in a perfectly isolated lab, and her task is to measure an observable X of a quantum system S . Wigner’s task is to analyse the same experiment from the outside, treating Alice’s entire lab as a quantum system. Crucial to this setup is that, when applying quantum theory, the two agents split the world differently into quantum and classical parts—i.e., they choose different ‘Heisenberg cuts’ 2 . Alice only models S as a quantum system and treats the outcome of her measurement X as part of the classical domain, yielding a definite value, x . In contrast, Wigner models Alice’s entire lab as part of the quantum domain, including Alice herself and her memory of the measurement outcome. Hence, for Wigner, Alice’s measurement is a reversible entangling operation between her and S , and x has no definite value. Alice and Wigner’s conclusions regarding x are thus different, although, at this point, they are not strictly contradictory. Fig. 1: Wigner’s friend experiment. The experiment concerns two quantum mechanics, Alice and Wigner. Alice measures a system S and records an outcome x . Alice applies the Heisenberg cut around system S : she treats S as a quantum system but regards herself, her notebook, and the outcome x as classical. Wigner analyses the situation from the outside, applying the Heisenberg cut around Alice’s entire isolated lab: he models Alice, her notebook, her measurement instruments, and everything else in her lab as quantum systems undergoing a global reversible evolution. Full size image
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.011 | 0.050 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.005 | 0.016 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.004 | 0.016 |
| Open science | 0.004 | 0.005 |
| Research integrity | 0.039 | 0.053 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.014 | 0.007 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".