Probabilities in Quantum Cosmological Models: A Decoherent Histories Analysis Using a Complex Potential

Understand

In the quantization of simple cosmological models (minisuperspace models) described by the Wheeler-DeWitt equation, an important step is the construction, from the wave function, of a probability distribution answering various questions of physical interest, such as the probability of the system entering a given region of configuration space at any stage in its entire history.

• A standard but heuristic procedure is to use the flux of (components of) the wave function in a WKB approximation.
• This gives sensible semiclassical results but lacks an underlying operator formalism.
• In this paper, we address the issue of constructing probability distributions linked to the Wheeler-DeWitt equation using the decoherent histories approach to quantum theory.