Talk:Quantum state space

Physics Low‑importance

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Skew, bias

<<...space in which different "positions" represent, not literal locations, but rather states of some physical system.>>

This turn of phrase wrongly suggests that (representation of) literal location is no usual part (of representation) of state. The article as it stands is not about "state spaces", it is about an idiosyncratic way to apprehend quantum mechanical state spaces. WP should have a standard name for this form of article defectiveness, when an extensive particularization is presented as universal. 2A01:CB15:69:A800:CCB1:F765:E2E6:BE78 (talk) 16:06, 24 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The phrase seems pretty clear to me. I guess most readers view "space" as consisting of locations. A state space does not consist of locations. I can't see how that is skewed, its just trying to be helpful. Johnjbarton (talk) 02:31, 10 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Any role outside of QM?

Are there uses of "state space" outside of quantum mechanics? I find the subsection "Quantum mechanics" odd, as I don't know of any other context. Seems like the section could be "Overview" instead. Johnjbarton (talk) 23:14, 10 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I propose to change the article to read as if the title were "Quantum-state space". If this creates an ambiguity we can change the title. I think the current lack of specifics makes the article harder to read and edit, a kind of abstract generality which has not other instance. Johnjbarton (talk) 16:28, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Redirect to itself?

@Roffaduft Can you help me understand why you added this line at the top:

"Quantum state space" redirects here. For other uses, see State space (disambiguation).

I think this line is confusing and unneccessary. I don't think the title of this article is ambiguous. The purpose of State space (disambiguation) is to deal with searches for "state space" which might not be "quantum state space". If someone searches for "quantum state space", they land here, done. How could they land here but want something else? Johnjbarton (talk) 15:41, 14 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with you that it’s probably unlikely that people would end up on the quantum state space page while looking for something else. From a practical point of view it may be unnecessary indeed.

The difference with e.g. “phase space” or “configuration space” is that this article explicitly has “state space” in the title. Therefore it seems to suggest it could be a version of the other state spaces mentioned in the disambiguation. What i tried to accomplish is to indicate that it is an entirely different concept without readers having to read the article. Roffaduft (talk) 17:30, 14 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I recently moved "State space (physics)" to "Quantum state space" because as far as I know, "state space" in physics almost always means quantum state space and I found numerous wikilinks on physics pages with the silly "State space (physics)" form.

In other words, while "phase space" and "configuration space" are owned by "physics", "state space" is ambiguous with non-physics things.

The opening paragraph mentions the relationship to phase space. I would prefer not to have the disambiguation link but I did change it a bit to avoid the self-reference. Johnjbarton (talk) 01:33, 15 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

i agree with the changes you’ve made. It’s more elegant that way, thank you. Roffaduft (talk) 02:12, 15 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]