The Copenhagen interpretation is a collection of views about the meaning of quantum mechanics principally attributed to Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg.
It is one of the oldest of numerous proposed interpretations of quantum mechanics, as features of it date to the development of quantum mechanics during 1925–1927, and it remains one of the most commonly taught.
Bell, John S. (1987), Speakable and Unspeakable in quantum Mechanics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press)
There is no definitive historical statement of what the Copenhagen interpretation is.
There are some fundamental agreements and disagreements between the views of Bohr and Heisenberg.
For example, Heisenberg emphasized a sharp "cut" between the observer (or the instrument) and the system being observed, while Bohr offered an interpretation that is independent of a subjective observer or measurement or collapse, which relies on an "irreversible" or effectively irreversible process, which could take place within the quantum system.
Features common to Copenhagen-type interpretations include the idea that quantum mechanics is intrinsically indeterministic, with probabilities calculated using the Born rule, and the principle of complementarity, which states that objects have certain pairs of complementary properties which cannot all be observed or measured simultaneously.
Moreover, the act of "observing" or "measuring" an object is irreversible, no truth can be attributed to an object except according to the results of its measurement.
Copenhagen-type interpretations hold that quantum descriptions are objective, in that they are independent of physicists' mental arbitrariness.
Over the years, there have been many objections to aspects of Copenhagen-type interpretations, including the discontinuous and stochastic nature of the "observation" or "measurement" process, the apparent subjectivity of requiring an observer, the difficulty of defining what might count as a measuring device, and the seeming reliance upon classical physics in describing such devices.
Background
Starting in 1900, investigations into atomic and subatomic phenomena forced a revision to the basic concepts of classical physics.
However, it was not until a quarter-century had elapsed that the revision reached the status of a coherent theory.
During the intervening period, now known as the time of the "old quantum theory", physicists worked with approximations and heuristic corrections to classical physics.
Notable results from this period include Max Planck's calculation of the blackbody radiation spectrum, Albert Einstein's explanation of the photoelectric effect, Einstein and Peter Debye's work on the specific heat of solids, Niels Bohr and Hendrika Johanna van Leeuwen's proof that classical physics cannot account for diamagnetism, Bohr's model of the hydrogen atom and Arnold Sommerfeld's extension of the Bohr model to include relativistic effects.
From 1922 through 1925, this method of heuristic corrections encountered increasing difficulties; for example, the Bohr–Sommerfeld model could not be extended from hydrogen to the next simplest case, the helium atom.
The transition from the old quantum theory to full-fledged quantum physics began in 1925, when Werner Heisenberg presented a treatment of electron behavior based on discussing only "observable" quantities, meaning to Heisenberg the frequencies of light that atoms absorbed and emitted.
Max Born then realized that in Heisenberg's theory, the classical variables of position and momentum would instead be represented by matrices, mathematical objects that can be multiplied together like numbers with the crucial difference that the order of multiplication matters.
Erwin Schrödinger presented an equation that treated the electron as a wave, and Born discovered that the way to successfully interpret the wave function that appeared in the Schrödinger equation was as a tool for calculating probabilities.
Quantum mechanics cannot easily be reconciled with everyday language and observation, and has often seemed counter-intuitive to physicists, including its inventors.
The ideas grouped together as the Copenhagen interpretation suggest a way to think about how the mathematics of quantum theory relates to physical reality.
Origin and use of the term
The term refers to the city of Copenhagen in Denmark, and was apparently coined during the 1950s.
Earlier, during the mid-1920s, Heisenberg had been an assistant to Bohr at his institute in Copenhagen, where they helped originate quantum mechanical theory.
At the 1927 Solvay Conference, a dual talk by Max Born and Heisenberg declared "we consider quantum mechanics to be a closed theory, whose fundamental physical and mathematical assumptions are no longer susceptible of any modification."
(This book contains a translation of the entire authorized proceedings of the 1927 Solvay conference from the original transcripts.)
In 1929, Heisenberg gave a series of invited lectures at the University of Chicago explaining the new field of quantum mechanics.
The lectures then served as the basis for his textbook, The Physical Principles of the Quantum Theory, published in 1930.
In the book's preface, Heisenberg wrote:
On the whole, the book contains nothing that is not to be found in previous publications, particularly in the investigations of Bohr.
The purpose of the book seems to me to be fulfilled if it contributes somewhat to the diffusion of that 'Kopenhagener Geist der Quantentheorie' [Copenhagen spirit of quantum theory] if I may so express myself, which has directed the entire development of modern atomic physics.
The term 'Copenhagen interpretation' suggests something more than just a spirit, such as some definite set of rules for interpreting the mathematical formalism of quantum mechanics, presumably dating back to the 1920s.
However, no such text exists, and the writings of Bohr and Heisenberg contradict each other on several important issues.
It appears that the particular term, with its more definite sense, was coined by Heisenberg around 1955, while criticizing alternative "interpretations" (e.g., David Bohm's) that had been developed.
Lectures with the titles 'The Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Theory' and 'Criticisms and Counterproposals to the Copenhagen Interpretation', that Heisenberg delivered in 1955, are reprinted in the collection Physics and Philosophy.
Before the book was released for sale, Heisenberg privately expressed regret for having used the term, due to its suggestion of the existence of other interpretations, that he considered to be "nonsense"."
I avow that the term ‘Copenhagen interpretation’ is not happy since it could suggest that there are other interpretations, like Bohm assumes.
We agree, of course, that the other interpretations are nonsense, and I believe that this is clear in my book, and in previous papers.
Anyway, I cannot now, unfortunately, change the book since the printing began enough time ago."
Quoted in  In a 1960 review of Heisenberg's book, Bohr's close collaborator Léon Rosenfeld called the term an "ambiguous expression" and suggested it be discarded.
However, this did not come to pass, and the term entered widespread use.
Principles
There is no uniquely definitive statement of the Copenhagen interpretation.
The term encompasses the views developed by a number of scientists and philosophers during the second quarter of the 20th century.
Bohr and Heisenberg never totally agreed on how to understand the mathematical formalism of quantum mechanics, and Bohr distanced himself from what he considered Heisenberg's more subjective interpretation.
Bohr offered an interpretation that is independent of a subjective observer, or measurement, or collapse; instead, an "irreversible" or effectively irreversible process causes the decay of quantum coherence which imparts the classical behavior of "observation" or "measurement".
Different commentators and researchers have associated various ideas with the term.
Asher Peres remarked that very different, sometimes opposite, views are presented as "the Copenhagen interpretation" by different authors.
N. David Mermin coined the phrase "Shut up and calculate!" to summarize Copenhagen-type views, a saying often misattributed to Richard Feynman and which Mermin later found insufficiently nuanced.
Mermin described the Copenhagen interpretation as coming in different "versions", "varieties", or "flavors".
Some basic principles generally accepted as part of the interpretation include the following:
Quantum mechanics is intrinsically indeterministic.
The correspondence principle: in the appropriate limit, quantum theory comes to resemble classical physics and reproduces the classical predictions.
The Born rule: the wave function of a system yields probabilities for the outcomes of measurements upon that system.
Complementarity: certain properties cannot be jointly defined for the same system at the same time.
In order to talk about a specific property of a system, that system must be considered within the context of a specific laboratory arrangement.
Observable quantities corresponding to mutually exclusive laboratory arrangements cannot be predicted together, but considering multiple such mutually exclusive experiments is necessary to characterize a system.
Hans Primas and Roland Omnès give a more detailed breakdown that, in addition to the above, includes the following:
Quantum physics applies to individual objects.
The probabilities computed by the Born rule do not require an ensemble or collection of "identically prepared" systems to understand.
The results provided by measuring devices are essentially classical, and should be described in ordinary language.
This was particularly emphasized by Bohr, and was accepted by Heisenberg.
Per the above point, the device used to observe a system must be described in classical language, while the system under observation is treated in quantum terms.
This is a particularly subtle issue for which Bohr and Heisenberg came to differing conclusions.
According to Heisenberg, the boundary between classical and quantum can be shifted in either direction at the observer's discretion.
That is, the observer has the freedom to move what would become known as the "Heisenberg cut" without changing any physically meaningful predictions.
On the other hand, Bohr argued that a complete specification of the laboratory apparatus would fix the "cut" in place.
Moreover, Bohr argued that at least some concepts of classical physics must be meaningful on both sides of the "cut".
During an observation, the system must interact with a laboratory device.
When that device makes a measurement, the wave function of the systems collapses, irreversibly reducing to an eigenstate of the observable that is registered.
The result of this process is a tangible record of the event, made by a potentiality becoming an actuality.
Statements about measurements that are not actually made do not have meaning.
For example, there is no meaning to the statement that a photon traversed the upper path of a Mach–Zehnder interferometer unless the interferometer were actually built in such a way that the path taken by the photon is detected and registered.
Wave functions are objective, in that they do not depend upon personal opinions of individual physicists or other such arbitrary influences.
Another issue of importance where Bohr and Heisenberg disagreed is wave–particle duality.
Bohr maintained that the distinction between a wave view and a particle view was defined by a distinction between experimental setups, whereas Heisenberg held that it was defined by the possibility of viewing the mathematical formulas as referring to waves or particles.
Bohr thought that a particular experimental setup would display either a wave picture or a particle picture, but not both.
Heisenberg thought that every mathematical formulation was capable of both wave and particle interpretations.
One difficulty in discussing the philosophical position of "the Copenhagen interpretation" is that there is no single, authoritative source that establishes what the interpretation is.
Another complication is that the philosophical background familiar to Einstein, Bohr, Heisenberg, and contemporaries is much less so to physicists and even philosophers of physics in more recent times.
Nature of the wave function
A wave function is a mathematical entity that provides a probability distribution for the outcomes of each possible measurement on a system.
Knowledge of the quantum state together with the rules for the system's evolution in time exhausts all that can be predicted about the system's behavior.
Generally, Copenhagen-type interpretations deny that the wave function provides a directly apprehensible image of an ordinary material body or a discernible component of some such,, p. 586: "there can be no question of an immediate connexion with our ordinary conceptions".Heisenberg, W. (1959/1971).
'Language and reality in modern physics', Chapter 10, pp.
145–160, in Physics and Philosophy: the Revolution in Modern Science, George Allen & Unwin, London, , p. 153: "our common concepts cannot be applied to the structure of the atoms." or anything more than a theoretical concept.
Probabilities via the Born rule
The Born rule is essential to the Copenhagen interpretation., p. 586: "In this connexion [Born] succeeded in obtaining a statistical interpretation of the wave functions, allowing a calculation of the probability of the individual transition processes required by the quantum postulate."
Formulated by Max Born in 1926, it gives the probability that a measurement of a quantum system will yield a given result.
In its simplest form, it states that the probability density of finding a particle at a given point, when measured, is proportional to the square of the magnitude of the particle's wave function at that point.
Collapse
A common perception of "the" Copenhagen interpretation is that an important part of it is the "collapse" of the wave function.
In the act of measurement, it is postulated, the wave function of a system can change suddenly and discontinuously.
Prior to a measurement, a wave function involves the various probabilities for the different potential outcomes of that measurement.
But when the apparatus registers one of those outcomes, no traces of the others linger.
Heisenberg spoke of the wave function as representing available knowledge of a system, and did not use the term "collapse", but instead termed it "reduction" of the wave function to a new state representing the change in available knowledge which occurs once a particular phenomenon is registered by the apparatus.W. Heisenberg "Über den anschaulichen Inhalt der quantentheoretischen Kinematik und Mechanik," Zeitschrift für Physik, Volume 43, 172–198 (1927), as translated by John Wheeler and Wojciech Zurek, in Quantum Theory and Measurement (1983), p.
74.  ("[The] determination of the position selects a definite "q" from the totality of possibilities and limits the options for all subsequent measurements.  ... [T]he results of later measurements can only be calculated when one again ascribes to the electron a "smaller" wavepacket of extension λ (wavelength of the light used in the observation).
Thus, every position determination reduces the wavepacket back to its original extension λ.")
According to Howard and Faye, the writings of Bohr do not mention wave function collapse.
Because they assert that the existence of an observed value depends upon the intercession of the observer, Copenhagen-type interpretations are sometimes called "subjective".
This term is rejected by many Copenhagenists because the process of observation is mechanical and does not depend on the individuality of the observer."
Of course the introduction of the observer must not be misunderstood to imply that some kind of subjective features are to be brought into the description of nature."
Heisenberg, W. (1959/1971).
Criticism and counterproposals to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum theory, Chapter 8, pp.
114–128, in Physics and Philosophy: the Revolution in Modern Science, third impression 1971, George Allen & Unwin, London, at p. 121.
Wolfgang Pauli, for example, insisted that measurement results could be obtained and recorded by "objective registering apparatus".
As Heisenberg wrote,
In the 1970s and 1980s, the theory of decoherence helped to explain the appearance of quasi-classical realities emerging from quantum theory, but was insufficient to provide a technical explanation for the apparent wave function collapse.
Completion by hidden variables?
In metaphysical terms, the Copenhagen interpretation views quantum mechanics as providing knowledge of phenomena, but not as pointing to 'really existing objects', which it regards as residues of ordinary intuition.
This makes it an epistemic theory.
This may be contrasted with Einstein's view, that physics should look for 'really existing objects', making itself an ontic theory.Jammer, M. (1982).
'Einstein and quantum physics', pp.
59–76 in Albert Einstein: Historical and Cultural Perspectives; the Centennial Symposium in Jerusalem, edited by G. Holton, Y. Elkana, Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ, .
On pp.
73–74, Jammer quotes a 1952 letter from Einstein to Besso: "The present quantum theory is unable to provide the description of a real state of physical facts, but only of an (incomplete) knowledge of such.
Moreover, the very concept of a real factual state is debarred by the orthodox theoreticians.
The situation arrived at corresponds almost exactly to that of the good old Bishop Berkeley."
The metaphysical question is sometimes asked: "Could quantum mechanics be extended by adding so-called "hidden variables" to the mathematical formalism, to convert it from an epistemic to an ontic theory?"
The Copenhagen interpretation answers this with a strong 'No'.Heisenberg, W. (1927).
Über den anschaulichen Inhalt der quantentheoretischen Kinematik und Mechanik, Z. Phys.
43: 172–198.
Translation as 'The actual content of quantum theoretical kinematics and mechanics' here: "Since the statistical nature of quantum theory is so closely [linked] to the uncertainty in all observations or perceptions, one could be tempted to conclude that behind the observed, statistical world a "real" world is hidden, in which the law of causality is applicable.
We want to state explicitly that we believe such speculations to be both fruitless and pointless.
The only task of physics is to describe the relation between observations."
It is sometimes alleged, for example by J.S. Bell, that Einstein opposed the Copenhagen interpretation because he believed that the answer to that question of "hidden variables" was "yes".
By contrast, Max Jammer writes "Einstein never proposed a hidden variable theory."
Jammer, M. (1982).
'Einstein and quantum physics', pp.
59–76 in Albert Einstein: Historical and Cultural Perspectives; the Centennial Symposium in Jerusalem, edited by G. Holton, Y. Elkana, Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ, , p.
72. Einstein explored the possibility of a hidden variable theory, and wrote a paper describing his exploration, but withdrew it from publication because he felt it was faulty.
Acceptance among physicists
During the 1930s and 1940s, views about quantum mechanics attributed to Bohr and emphasizing complementarity became commonplace among physicists.
Textbooks of the time generally maintained the principle that the numerical value of a physical quantity is not meaningful or does not exist until it is measured.
Prominent physicists associated with Copenhagen-type interpretations have included Lev Landau, Wolfgang Pauli, Rudolf Peierls, Asher Peres, Léon Rosenfeld, and Ray Streater.
Throughout much of the 20th century, the Copenhagen tradition had overwhelming acceptance among physicists.
According to a very informal poll (some people voted for multiple interpretations) conducted at a quantum mechanics conference in 1997, the Copenhagen interpretation remained the most widely accepted label that physicists applied to their own views.
A similar result was found in a poll conducted in 2011.
Consequences
The nature of the Copenhagen interpretation is exposed by considering a number of experiments and paradoxes.
<small>1. [[Schrödinger's cat]]
</small>
This thought experiment highlights the implications that accepting uncertainty at the microscopic level has on macroscopic objects.
A cat is put in a sealed box, with its life or death made dependent on the state of a subatomic particle.
Thus a description of the cat during the course of the experiment—having been entangled with the state of a subatomic particle—becomes a "blur" of "living and dead cat."
But this can't be accurate because it implies the cat is actually both dead and alive until the box is opened to check on it.
But the cat, if it survives, will only remember being alive.
Schrödinger resists "so naively accepting as valid a 'blurred model' for representing reality."
How can the cat be both alive and dead?
The Copenhagen interpretation: The wave function reflects our knowledge of the system.
The wave function (|\text{dead}\rangle + |\text{alive}\rangle)/\sqrt 2 means that, once the cat is observed, there is a 50% chance it will be dead, and 50% chance it will be alive.
<small>2. [[Wigner's friend]]
</small>
Wigner puts his friend in with the cat.
The external observer believes the system is in state (|\text{dead}\rangle + |\text{alive}\rangle)/\sqrt 2.
However, his friend is convinced that the cat is alive, i.e. for him, the cat is in the state |\text{alive}\rangle.
How can Wigner and his friend see different wave functions?
The Copenhagen interpretation: The answer depends on the positioning of Heisenberg cut, which can be placed arbitrarily (at least according to Heisenberg, though not to Bohr).
If Wigner's friend is positioned on the same side of the cut as the external observer, his measurements collapse the wave function for both observers.
If he is positioned on the cat's side, his interaction with the cat is not considered a measurement.
<small>3. [[Double-slit experiment|Double-slit]] [[diffraction]]
</small>
Light passes through double slits and onto a screen resulting in a diffraction pattern.
Is light a particle or a wave?
The Copenhagen interpretation: Light is neither.
A particular experiment can demonstrate particle (photon) or wave properties, but not both at the same time (Bohr's complementarity principle).
The same experiment can in theory be performed with any physical system: electrons, protons, atoms, molecules, viruses, bacteria, cats, humans, elephants, planets, etc.
In practice it has been performed for light, electrons, buckminsterfullerene, and some atoms.
Due to the smallness of Planck's constant it is practically impossible to realize experiments that directly reveal the wave nature of any system bigger than a few atoms; but in general quantum mechanics considers all matter as possessing both particle and wave behaviors.
Larger systems (like viruses, bacteria, cats, etc.) are considered as "classical" ones but only as an approximation, not exact.
<small>4. [[EPR paradox|Einstein–Podolsky–Rosen paradox]]
</small>
Entangled "particles" are emitted in a single event.
Conservation laws ensure that the measured spin of one particle must be the opposite of the measured spin of the other, so that if the spin of one particle is measured, the spin of the other particle is now instantaneously known.
Because this outcome cannot be separated from quantum randomness, no information can be sent in this manner and there is no violation of either special relativity or the Copenhagen interpretation.
The Copenhagen interpretation: Assuming wave functions are not real, wave-function collapse is interpreted subjectively.
The moment one observer measures the spin of one particle, they know the spin of the other.
However, another observer cannot benefit until the results of that measurement have been relayed to them, at less than or equal to the speed of light.
Criticism
Incompleteness and indeterminism
Einstein was an early and persistent critic of the Copenhagen school.
Bohr and Heisenberg advanced the position that no physical property could be understood without an act of measurement, while Einstein refused to accept this.
Abraham Pais recalled a walk with Einstein when the two discussed quantum mechanics: "Einstein suddenly stopped, turned to me and asked whether I really believed that the moon exists only when I look at it."
While Einstein did not doubt that quantum mechanics was a correct physical theory in that it gave correct predictions, he maintained that it could not be a complete theory.
The most famous product of his efforts to argue the incompleteness of quantum theory is the Einstein–Podolsky–Rosen thought experiment, which was intended to show that physical properties like position and momentum have values even if not measured.
The argument of EPR was not generally persuasive to other physicists.
Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker, while participating in a colloquium at Cambridge, denied that the Copenhagen interpretation asserted "What cannot be observed does not exist".
Instead, he suggested that the Copenhagen interpretation follows the principle "What is observed certainly exists; about what is not observed we are still free to make suitable assumptions.
We use that freedom to avoid paradoxes."
Einstein was likewise dissatisfied with the indeterminism of quantum theory.
Regarding the possibility of randomness in nature, Einstein said that he was "convinced that He [God] does not throw dice."
Letter to Max Born (4 December 1926);  Bohr, in response, reputedly said that "it cannot be for us to tell God, how he is to run the world".
The "shifty split"
Much criticism of Copenhagen-type interpretations has focused on the need for a classical domain where observers or measuring devices can reside, and the imprecision of how the boundary between quantum and classical might be defined.
John Bell called this the "shifty split".
As typically portrayed, Copenhagen-type interpretations involve two different kinds of time evolution for wave functions, the deterministic flow according to the Schrödinger equation and the probabilistic jump during measurement, without a clear criterion for when each kind applies.
Why should these two different processes exist, when physicists and laboratory equipment are made of the same matter as the rest of the universe?
And if there is somehow a split, where should it be placed?
Steven Weinberg writes that the traditional presentation gives "no way to locate the boundary between the realms in which [...] quantum mechanics does or does not apply."
The problem of thinking in terms of classical measurements of a quantum system becomes particularly acute in the field of quantum cosmology, where the quantum system is the universe.'
Since the Universe naturally contains all of its observers, the problem arises to come up with an interpretation of quantum theory that contains no classical realms on the fundamental level.'
,  How does an observer stand outside the universe in order to measure it, and who was there to observe the universe in its earliest stages?
Advocates of Copenhagen-type interpretations have disputed the seriousness of these objections.
Rudolf Peierls noted that "the observer does not have to be contemporaneous with the event"; for example, we study the early universe through the cosmic microwave background, and we can apply quantum mechanics to that just as well as to any electromagnetic field.
Likewise, Asher Peres argued that physicists are, conceptually, outside those degrees of freedom that cosmology studies, and applying quantum mechanics to the radius of the universe while neglecting the physicists in it is no different from quantizing the electric current in a superconductor while neglecting the atomic-level details.
E. T. Jaynes, an advocate of Bayesian probability, argued that probability is a measure of a state of information about the physical world, and so regarding it as a physical phenomenon would be an example of a mind projection fallacy.
Jaynes described the mathematical formalism of quantum physics as "a peculiar mixture describing in part realities of Nature, in part incomplete human information about Nature—all scrambled up together by Heisenberg and Bohr into an omelette that nobody has seen how to unscramble".
Alternatives
The ensemble interpretation is similar; it offers an interpretation of the wave function, but not for single particles.
The consistent histories interpretation advertises itself as "Copenhagen done right".
More recently, interpretations inspired by quantum information theory like QBism and relational quantum mechanics have attracted support.
Under realism and determinism, if the wave function is regarded as ontologically real, and collapse is entirely rejected, a many worlds theory results.
If wave function collapse is regarded as ontologically real as well, an objective collapse theory is obtained.
Bohmian mechanics shows that it is possible to reformulate quantum mechanics to make it deterministic, at the price of making it explicitly nonlocal.
It attributes not only a wave function to a physical system, but in addition a real position, that evolves deterministically under a nonlocal guiding equation.
The evolution of a physical system is given at all times by the Schrödinger equation together with the guiding equation; there is never a collapse of the wave function.
The transactional interpretation is also explicitly nonlocal.
Some physicists espoused views in the "Copenhagen spirit" and then went on to advocate other interpretations.
For example, David Bohm and Alfred Landé both wrote textbooks that put forth ideas in the Bohr–Heisenberg tradition, and later promoted nonlocal hidden variables and an ensemble interpretation respectively.
John Archibald Wheeler began his career as an "apostle of Niels Bohr"; he then supervised the PhD thesis of Hugh Everett that proposed the many-worlds interpretation.
After supporting Everett's work for several years, he began to distance himself from the many-worlds interpretation in the 1970s.
Late in life, he wrote that while the Copenhagen interpretation might fairly be called "the fog from the north", it "remains the best interpretation of the quantum that we have".
Other physicists, while influenced by the Copenhagen tradition, have expressed frustration at how it took the mathematical formalism of quantum theory as given, rather than trying to understand how it might arise from something more fundamental.
This dissatisfaction has motivated new interpretative variants as well as technical work in quantum foundations.
Physicists who have suggested that the Copenhagen tradition needs to be built upon or extended include Rudolf Haag and Anton Zeilinger.
See also
Bohr–Einstein debates
Einstein's thought experiments
Fifth Solvay Conference
Philosophical interpretation of classical physics
Physical ontology
Popper's experiment
Notes
References
Further reading
