Time scale, objectivity and irreversibility in quantum mechanics

Abstract

It is argued that setting isolated systems as primary scope of field theory and looking at particles as derived entities, the problem of an objective anchorage of quantum mechanics can be solved and irreversibility acquires a fundamental role. These general ideas are checked in the case of the Boltzmann description of a dilute gas.

13 pages, latex, no figures, to appear in the Proceedings of the XXI International Colloquium on Group Theoretical Methods in Physics, 1996 (Goslar, Germany)