In this instance, the popular understanding corresponds to the latest research better than realist theories like pilot-wave theory. Proponents of realist interp

In this instance, the popular understanding corresponds to the latest research better than realist theories like pilot-wave theory. Proponents of realist interpretations of QM have relied for decades on identifying possible classical channels of relativistic communication, or theorizing the existence of hidden variables. The double slit experiment has been used in various forms to, over time, eliminate these channels. I'm not a physicist, but the language that they are using quite a few papers leads me to believe that these channels have been closed, and the realists are out of remaining options for maintaining realism. For instance: An experimental test of non-local realism, 2007 https://arxiv.org/abs/0704.2529 https://arxiv.org/abs/0704.2529 Wherein the authors show, using previously untested correlations between two entangled photons, that maintaining realist interpretations of quantum mechanics (such as pilot-wave theory) as a fundamental concept require the introduction of locality-defying 'action at a distance' actions. Quantum erasure with causally disconnected choice, 2012 https://arxiv.org/abs/1206.6578 https://arxiv.org/abs/1206.6578 Wherein the authors, using an interferometric quantum eraser experiment, eliminate past and future communication channels by enforcing Einstein locality via a mechanism that I don't understand yet. They conclude that, "No naive realistic picture is compatible with our results because whether a quantum could be seen as showing particle- or wave-like behavior would depend on a causally disconnected choice. It is therefore suggestive to abandon such pictures altogether." Experimental non-classicality of an indivisible quantum system, 2011 https://arxiv.org/abs/1106.4481 https://arxiv.org/abs/1106.4481 I understand even less of this one, looks like it has to do with performing the kinds of simultaneous measurements of various properties that one would expect to be able to, if realist interpretations were true. They conclude, "Not only is a single qutrit the simplest system in which such a contradiction is possible, but, even more importantly, the contradiction cannot result from entanglement, because such a system is indivisible, and it does not even allow the concept of entanglement between subsystems." UPDATE: Experimental loophole-free violation of a Bell inequality using entangled electron spins separated by 1.3 km 2015 https://arxiv.org/abs/1508.05949v1 https://arxiv.org/abs/1508.05949v1 "For more than 80 years, the counterintuitive predictions of quantum theory have stimulated debate about the nature of reality. ... In the past decades, numerous ingenious Bell inequality tests have been reported. However, because of experimental limitations, all experiments to date required additional assumptions to obtain a contradiction with local realism, resulting in loopholes. Here we report on a Bell experiment that is free of any such additional assumption and thus directly tests the principles underlying Bell's inequality. ... This result rules out large classes of local realist theories, and paves the way for implementing device-independent quantum-secure communication and randomness certification." I'm not aware of any significant challenges to these studies.