Measurement As Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking, Non-locality and Non-Boolean Holism

It is shown that having degenerate ground states over the domain of the wavefunction of a system is a sufficient condition for a quantum system to act as a measuring apparatus for the system. Measurements are then instances of spontaneous symmetry breaking to one of these ground states, induced by environmental perturbations. Together with non-Boolean holism this constitutes an optimal formulation of quantum mechanics that does not imply non-locality.Comment: 12 pages, based on talk given at the International Conference on "Quantum Systems, Classical Measurements and Consequences'' at SVYASA University, Bangalore on June 28, 2010 and at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore on July 1, 201