The central mystery of quantum mechanics

Abstract

A critical re-examination of the double-slit experiment and its variants is presented to clarify the nature of what Feynman called the "central mystery" and the "only mystery"of quantum mechanics, leading to an interpretation of complementarity in which a 'wave and particle' description rather than a wave or particle' description is valid for the same experimental set up, with the wave culminating in the particle sequentially in time. This interpretation is different from Bohr's but is consistent with the von Neumann formulation as well as some more recent interpretations of quantum mechanics.