The leading alternative interpretation was developed in 1957 by American physicist Hugh Everett, who proposed that the universe splits every time there’s an event with more than one possible outcome. Each different universe evolves with one of the possibilities realized. As shown in Figure 120, the bizarre, but logically consistent Many-Worlds Theory interprets the Schrödinger cat thought experiment by explaining that it causes the universe to branch into two separate universes: one in which the cat is alive, and one in which the cat is dead. The cat is both alive and dead, irrespective of whether the box is opened, but the “alive” and “dead” cats are in different branches of the universe, both of which are equally real, but which cannot interact with each other. As such, the Many-Worlds Interpretation requires there to be a very large—perhaps infinite—number of universes, and everything that could possibly have happened in our past, but didn’t, has occurred in the past of some other universe or universes.
Figure 120 According to the Many-Worlds Interpretation, Schrödinger’s cat experiment poses a branching point for the universe. The cat is both alive and dead, irrespective of whether the box is opened, but the “alive” and “dead” cats are in different branches of the universe, both of which are equally real, but which cannot interact with each other. This figure was obtained from WikiMedia Commons, and may be copied, distributed, and/or modified under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License.
There are a number of other alternative interpretations of quantum mechanics. Each has its strengths and weaknesses, but they are all outside the scope. In general, we feel that the contrast between Einstein’s classical arguments and Bohr’s Copenhagen Interpretation provides an excellent framework for our purposes.
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