Quantum Physics: From Illusion to Reality

The double-slit experiment has been widely discussed since the beginning of quantum mechanics. Many popular science books use the experiment to illustrate the wave-particle duality of light and matter. According to Richard Feynman, the double-slit experiment contains the only mystery of quantum mechanics. After we have unveiled the mystery, we will be able to understand quantum mechanics.

What is the mystery then? The mystery lies in understanding the counterintuitive experimental results. What do they imply for the nature of reality? How on earth does a single electron pass through two slits at the same time? Exactly what is an electron? There are already many possible pictures of quantum reality. From pilot wave and Brownian motion to many worlds and dynamical collapse, every interpretation claims that it gives the right answer. But which one is right? Or none of them is right? Obviously there is only one true picture of quantum reality. Can we find it now?

It has been widely thought that the mystery of quantum mechanics can only be unveiled by future precise experiments. However, this may be not the case. This little book will show that a penetrating analysis can already lead us to the way out of the maze of quantum interpretations. In the end, the true picture of quantum reality will naturally appear, and it can also be understood by general readers. To our great surprise, quantum mechanics already tells the secret. It is that a single electron passes through two slits at the same time in a discontinuous and random way.

Book & Thoughts Reviews:

This is an ambitious work that reflects admirable grip, and distinctive take, on much of the contemporary philosophy of quantum mechanics literature.
---- Reviewer of Philosophy of Science

The idea of using discontinuous motion as a realist interpretation of quantum mechanics is original.
---- Reviewer of Foundations of Physics

Its very existence is at any rate, an excellent illustration of the extent to which physical data force us to depart from commonsense ideas when we try to depict reality “as it really is”.
---- Bernard d'Espagnat, Templeton Prize 2009 Laureate, author of Conceptual Foundations of Quantum Mechanics and On Physics and Philosophy