Skip to main content

Nick Ormrod

Personal photo - Nick Ormrod

Nick Ormrod

Doctoral Student

Wolfson Building, Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3QD

Interests

I am interested in foundational questions about modern physics. More specifically, my research focuses on how our concept of causation should be updated in light of quantum theory, and conversely how new ideas about causation might help us to better understand quantum theory itself.

During my doctoral studies so far, this has involved (1) developing the framework of quantum causal modelling, (2) developing no-go theorems that sharpen our understanding of the foundational problems posed by quantum theory, and finally (3) addressing those problems with a precise, realist reformulation of quantum theory based on causation.

Looking ahead, I would like to better understand the intersections between between quantum causation and (a) proofs of nonclassicality (in the sense of genralized contextuality), (b) the emergence of an approximately classical world from an underlying quantum reality, and (c) gravity. In particular, I would like to extend the formalism from https://pirsa.org/23090026 in order to address each of these problems. I am also interested in searching for qualitatively novel no-go theorems. In recent years, structurally similar proofs have been given for "nonabsoluteness"  in "extended Wigner's friend scenarios" and also for "indefinite causal order" in the "quantum switch" -- what else can we prove using the same tricks?

Biography

Physics and Philosophy MSci at the University of Bristol (2016 -- 2020).

Activities

Supervisor