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- A Quantum Sense and Nonsense
A simplified version of “Making sense of quantum mechanics” by the same author, retains all main messages and devotes relatively more space to the philosophical, historical, and sociological reasons for the standing condition of the perception of quantum mechanics – irrespective of the results of Bohm and Bell in particular, with whom the author is simpathetic. In his usual, concise, no-nonsense and clear style, Bricmont here gets to the heart of the matter very sharply, with hints of humor (perhaps also inherited by Bell) and constant focus on discerning what a real theory of quantum phenomena should do and should be versus what ordinary quantum mechanics does, it being not a theory as far as explanatory power but rather an algorithm to (shut up and) calculate results of laboratory experiments.
Ample suggested readings and references, and handy summaries of each chapter are also provided, which contribute to make this a great entry point to anyone willing to even only check whether most of the fuzz around “quantum” is legitimate or not (the answer is almost everywhere “not”). That said, this is a little too expensive, and works mostly as a non-technical reminder to “Making sense” for the non-beginner reader.