Introduction to Quantum Mechanics: From Facts to Formalism

Quantum Mechanics is based on the superposition principle and uses vector spaces and linear transformations to describe its empirical content. This book aims to demonstrate how the factual content of quantum mechanics can be transcribed in the formal language of vector spaces and linear transformations, while also bringing out what this transcription achieves. It is intended as an undergraduate text for a first course in quantum mechanics and can also be used by enthusiastic outsiders interested in getting a glimpse of the core content of the subject.

Format: Hardback
Length: 250 pages
Publication date: 20 August 2021
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

The fundamental essence of even the most complex intellectual structures is frequently a straightforward truth or concept. This is also true of quantum mechanics, where the entire mathematical framework of the formal description of quantum mechanics is founded on the phenomenon of quantum probabilities interfering, or, more specifically, on the superposition principle. This book is devoted to supporting this assertion. The book aims to show how the factual content of quantum mechanics can be expressed in the formal language of vector spaces and linear transformations by separating the empirical content from the conventional formal description in the course of accomplishing this. More importantly, it aims to highlight what this transcription accomplishes.

The book employs a pedagogical approach that reverse engineers the postulates of quantum mechanics to construct a schematic outline of the empirical content of quantum mechanics from which the postulates are then reconstructed step by step. This approach is adopted to avoid the disconcerting details of actual experiments (however simplified) to spare the beginner of issues that lurk in the fragile foundations of the subject.

In the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, the key idea is measurement. However, measurement carries a completely different meaning from the connotation that the term carries elsewhere in physics. This book strives to underline this as strongly as possible. The book is intended as an undergraduate text for a first course in quantum mechanics. Since the book is self-contained, it may also be used by enthusiastic outsiders interested in getting a glimpse of the core content of the subject.

Features:

Demonstrates why linear algebra is the appropriate mathematical language for quantum mechanics.

Uses a reconstructive approach to motivate.

Weight: 554g
Dimension: 159 x 242 x 22 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780367547073