The Kochen-Specker Paradox and Great-Circle Descents

• The Kochen-Specker paradox has recently been subject to experimental interest, and in this situation the number of steps in the proof in question is important. The fewer number of steps there are in the proof, the more imperfections can be tolerated in the experimental setup. In the spin-1 version of the Kochen-Specker paradox, when the settings used are directions in three-dimensional space, the proofs can be easily visualized and the steps can easily be counted. In particular, the original Kochen-Specker paradox makes use of so-called great-circle descents. Here, we will examine such descents in detail and also some other versions of the proof for spin-1 systems. We will see that, perhaps contrary to intuition, the proofs that use a small number of steps do not in general use only great-circle descents, and examine the reasons for this and possible extensions. At least one new proof will also be presented for the spin-1 case.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Matematik (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Mathematics (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Quantum theory

Bell theorem

Probability

MATHEMATICS

MATEMATIK

Publication and Content Type

vet (subject category)

kon (subject category)