Aiming at Describing Empirical Reality

Introductory Abstract

The interpretational difficulties besetting Quantum Mechanics can to a large extent be circumvented by adopting the view that the referent of the theory is merely Empirical Reality, that is, the set of the phenomena, in the philosophical sense of the word. One possible materialization of this idea, partly based on the consistent histories approach, was described by me elsewhere. An alternative one — called the Operational Theory — is put forward here. The explanatory power of such a quantum theory of Empirical Reality is shown to equal that — based on causality — of more realistic theories. The new theory of Empirical Reality is compared with the earlier one, as well as with the consistent histories models Finally, recent findings concerning our inability at truly explaining observed classicality are turned into a novel argument strengthening the (Kantian) conception that the fact we apprehend the World as classical (and probabilistic) is of an irreducible nature.