Chance in the Everett interpretation

TL;DR

This paper explores how the branching structure in the Everett interpretation of quantum mechanics offers a comprehensive account of objective chance, linking it to frequencies, beliefs, and phenomenology of chance events.

Contribution

It proposes that the decoherence-based many worlds theory provides a novel, unified explanation of chance as involving uncertainty and connecting it with observable phenomena.

Findings

Branching structure explains the phenomenology of chance events.

Chance is linked to uncertainty within the many worlds framework.

The theory unifies chance with frequencies and degrees of belief.

Abstract

The notion of objective probability or chance, as a physical trait of the world, has proved elusive; the identification of chances with actual frequencies does not succeed. An adequate theory of chance should explain not only the connection of chance with statistics, but with degrees of belief, and more broadly the entire phenomenology of (seemingly) chance events and their measurement. Branching structure in the decoherence-based many worlds theory provides an account of what chance is that satisfies all these desiderata, including the requirement that chance involves uncertainty.