Paper detail

Time reversal symmetry and collapse models

Collapse models are modifications of quantum theory where the wave function is treated as physically real and the collapse of the wave function is a physical process. This appears to introduce a time reversal asymmetry into the dynamics of the wave function since the collapses affect only the future state. This paper challenges this conclusion, showing that in three different examples of time asymmetries associated with collapse models, if the physically real part of the model can be reduced to the locations in space and time about which collapses occur, then such a model works both forward and backward in time, in each case satisfying the Born rule. Despite the apparent asymmetry of the collapse process, these models in fact have time reversal symmetry. Any physically observed time asymmetries that arise in such models are due to the asymmetric imposition of initial or final time boundary conditions, rather than from an inherent asymmetry in the dynamical law. This is the standard explanation of time asymmetric behaviour resulting from time symmetric laws.