Everettian chance in no uncertain terms
Abstract
The current landscape of views on the role of chance in the Everett interpretation is rocky. Everettians (Wallace 2012, Sebens and Carroll 2018, McQueen and Vaidman 2019) agree that chance values should be derived using principles governing uncertain or partial belief, but cannot agree on how. Critics (Baker 2007, Dawid and Thébault 2015, Mandolesi 2019) maintain that any such approach is circular. We smooth the landscape by shifting focus from what Everettians take to be uncertain to what they should think is certain: namely, the conditions under which branches are isolated. Our approach to isolation resolves the main tensions among the different Everettian chance derivations while clarifying how they avoid circularity.
Type
Slides

Authors
Jer Steeger
(they/he)
British Academy International Fellow
Jer Steeger is a historian and philosopher of physics taking a pluralist approach to issues in quantum foundations and physics education research.

Authors
James Read
(he/him)
Associate Professor
James Read is a philosopher of physics focusing on the on the foundations of spacetime theories, as well as quantum mechanics.