Einstein's Objections against Quantum Mechanics

Abstract

After the discovery of quantum mechanics by Heisenberg and Schrödinger in 1925, Einstein raised again and again objections to this theory. Obviously, he had the impression that (a) quantum mechanics does not adequately grasp reality, that it is (b) based on probabilistic laws of nature and that it is (c) for this reason incomplete. Einstein must have obtained this impression from many presentations of quantum mechanics in the first decade after its discovery. -- However, technical refutations of Einstein's objections were not possible when these arguments were put forward, since the necessary formal tools were not yet available at this time. Instead, the advocates of quantum mechanics tried to disprove Einstein merely by intuitive and less rigorous arguments. -- In the light of current physics we find that the objections (a) and (b) are irrelevant since, in accordance with Einstein's intentions, quantum mechanics does refer to reality and is not based on probabilistic laws. Only the incompleteness argument is incorrect. However, for technical reasons a convincing refutation of this objection only became possible thirty years after its formulation and ten years after Einstein's death.