Apparent energy-speed relationship poses no challenge to Bohmian mechanics

2025/07/24 by Matthew Dickau, Dickau, Matthew · 3 citations
Arts and Humanities · Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #Philosophy, Science, and History #Quantum Mechanics and Applications #Quantum Physics (quant-ph) #Relativity and Gravitational Theory

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2507.18826

openalex publication_date 2025/07/24 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

A recent article claims to measure the speed of quantum particles in the classically forbidden regime where the energy of the particles is lower than the local potential, and further claims that the results of this experiment challenge Bohmian mechanics. But this interpretation of the experiment is incorrect (and dubious even in the context of ordinary quantum mechanics). A proper analysis of the system from a pilot-wave perspective shows that it predicts the same distribution of particle positions (and so the same experimental results) as ordinary quantum theory. The speed measured by the experiment in this regime is fictitious.

Citations

• Tunnelling photons pose no challenge to Bohmian machanics
• How and why to think about scattering in terms of wave packets instead of plane waves

Cited by

• Instantaneous velocity during quantum tunnelling
• Formal equivalence between Maxwell equations and the de Broglie-Bohm theory for two-dimensional optical microcavities
• Reaffirming a Challenge to Bohmian Mechanics

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