Abstract

Quantum decoherence is receiving a great deal of attention today not only in theoretical and experimental physics but also in branches of science as diverse as molecular biology, biochemistry, and even neuropsychology. It is no surprise that it is also beginning to appear in various philosophical debates concerning the fundamental structure of the world. The purpose of this article is primarily to acquaint non-specialists with quantum decoherence and clarify related concepts, and secondly to sketch its possible implications – independent of particular interpretations of quantum mechanics – for broader philosophical debates. For example, decoherence shows that any method of parsing nature into levels or parts cannot be in principle but instead derives from our perception of the world as classical, a perception that is itself sustained by the process of decoherence