How the Result of a Single Coin Toss Can Turn Out to be 100 Heads

Abstract

We show that the phenomenon of anomalous weak values is not limited to quantum theory. In particular, we show that the same features occur in a simple model of a coin subject to a form of classical backaction with pre- and postselection. This provides evidence that weak values are not inherently quantum but rather a purely statistical feature of pre- and postselection with disturbance.