Will We Ever Quantize the Centers of Mass of Heavy Systems? A Case for a Heisenberg Cut in Quantum Mechanics

Abstract

The quantum orthodoxy attests that all dynamical degrees of freedom should be quantized, including those associated with the centers of mass of composite/complex systems, such as protons/pebbles. By assuming that the centers of mass of protons/pebbles should be quantized, one implies the existence of a corresponding Fock space, since, according to the present lore, quantum mechanics is a consequence of quantum field theory. Despite the fabulous success of quantum mechanics, it is unreasonable to assume the existence of annihilation and creation operators for pebbles. Fortunately, there are strong reasons to doubt that wave mechanics can describe the centers of mass of systems at or above the Planck scale, thereby jeopardizing the construction of the corresponding Fock space. We argue that isolated (free) systems with masses exceeding the Planck mass would have their centers of mass governed by classical (rather than quantum) mechanics, despite harboring macroscopic quantum phenomena as observed in the laboratory. Here, we briefly revisit (i) the arguments for the need for a Heisenberg cut delimiting the boundary between the quantum and classical realms and (ii) the kind of new physics expected at (the uncharted region of) the Heisenberg cut.