Wednesday 30 September 2020

Is every quantum measurement reducible to measurements of position and time?


I am currently studying Path Integrals and was unable to resolve the following problem. In the famous book Quantum Mechanics and Path Integrals, written by Feynman and Hibbs, it says (at the beginning of Chapter 5 Measurements an Operators, on page 96):




So far we have described quantum-mechanical systems as if we intended to measure only the coordinates of position and time. Indeed, all measurements of quantum mechanical systems could be made to reduce eventually to position and time measurements (e.g., the position of a needle on a meter or time of flight of a particle). Because of this possibility a theory formulated in terms of position measurements is complete enough to describe all phenomena.



To me this seems to be a highly non trivial statement (is it even true?) and I was unable to find any satisfying elaboration on this in the literature.


I would be thankful for any answer to resolve this question and any reference to the literature!




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