In 1964 theoretical physicist John Bell showed that if hidden variables, whatever their form, are local, then they could be tested against conventional quantum mechanics.
In 1982 a definitive series of “EPR experiments” with this configuration was carried out by Alain Aspect and his collaborators at the Institut d’Optique Théoretique et Appliquée in Orsay, France. They arranged it so the decision on the orientation of the polarimeter axes was made after the photon pair left the source so that only a superluminal signal could share the information between the detectors. The results agreed perfectly with conventional quantum mechanics and thus ruled out any subquantum theory with local hidden variables.
The EPR results are widely discussed in the literature of quantum spiritualism. Physicists, on the other hand, are underwhelmed. Quantum mechanics has passed yet another empirical test. Ho hum.


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