From the Back Cover
Quantum physics is the most comprehensive scientific theory of all time, yet its foundations have been mired in confusion since the dawn of the twentieth century. We are still unable to find consensus about wave-particle duality, the double-slit experiment, quantum randomness, entanglement, superpositions, and the measurement problem. That is, we disagree about what quantum physics means.
Physicists need to get their act together!
This book presents a resolution of these problems, based on the quantum field theory insight that reality comprises a set of universal quantized fields that fill the universe. An immediate consequence is that there are no particles; objects (properly called "quanta") such as photons and electrons are highly unified spatially extended bundles of field energy. As Steven Weinberg puts it, "particles are derivative phenomena." This view immediately resolves, for example, the puzzle of the double-slit experiment. As this book shows, we can dispense with the diverse interpretations such as consciousness-based views, the many worlds view, and the Copenhagen view that there is no quantum world. Quantum physics can thus return to being a normal scientific endeavor with no special interpretation outside of standard (since Copernicus) scientific realism; this is the view that nature exists on its own with no need for observers.
Art Hobson has written five previous books:
- Concepts in Statistical Mechanics, a research monograph (Gordon and Breach Science Publishers 1971, Chemical Rubber Company 1987);
- Physics and Human Affairs, a non-mathematical textbook for non-science college students (John Wiley & Sons 1982);
- The Future of Land-Based Strategic Missiles, (American Institute of Physics 1989); co-editor and co-author with 9 other authors;
- Physics: Concepts & Connections, (Pearson/Addison-Wesley 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, 2010), another textbook for non-science college students;
- Tales of the Quantum (Oxford University Press 2017), a non-mathematical overview of quantum physics.
He has written numerous technical and pedagogical physics papers, including the following pre-cursors to Fields and their Quanta:
- "There are no particles, there are only fields, "American Journal of Physics 81, 211-223 (2013);
- "A realist analysis of six controversial quantum issues," in Mario Bunge Festschrift (Springer 2019), pp. 329-348;
- "Entanglement and the measurement problem," Quantum Engineering 2022, ID 5889159 (2022).
Hobson was born in Philadelphia in 1934 and moved to Manhattan, Kansas in 1945. He received a Bachelor of Music degree in 1955. After 2 years in the Army in Germany, he spent six months in New York City trying but failing to be a professional jazz musician. He then switched to physics and enrolled at Kansas State University in 1958, graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1960, and received a physics PhD in 1964. He then joined the University of Arkansas faculty where he taught and did research until retiring in 1999. He has authored over 175 professional articles, mostly theoretical physics and physics education. He received the American Association of Physics Teachers' 2006 "Millikan Award for Teaching Excellence" for bringing scientific literacy to all college students, and received a "Master Teacher" award from his university. Since "retiring" in 1999, Hobson has had time to study his favorite topic, quantum foundations. He maintains an office in the physics department and commutes to work on his bicycle.
