Quantum causal models

          @misc{ scivideos_PIRSA:18070048,
            doi = {10.48660/18070048},
            url = {https://pirsa.org/18070048},
            author = {Barrett, Jonathan},
            keywords = {Quantum Foundations},
            language = {en},
            title = {Quantum causal models},
            publisher = {Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics},
            year = {2018},
            month = {jul},
            note = {PIRSA:18070048 see, \url{https://scivideos.org/pirsa/18070048}}
          }
          

Abstract

From a brief discussion of how to generalise Reichenbach’s Principle of the Common Cause to the case of quantum systems, I will develop a formalism to describe any set of quantum systems that have specified causal relationships between them. This formalism is the nearest quantum analogue to the classical causal models of Judea Pearl and others. At the heart of the classical formalism lies the idea that facts about causal structure enforce constraints on probability distributions in the form of conditional independences. I will describe a quantum analogue of this idea, which leads to a quantum version of the three rules of Pearl’s do-calculus. If time, I will end with some more speculative remarks concerning the significance of the work for the foundations of quantum theory.