this post was submitted on 08 May 2026
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I think we all understand the joke is that the eyes represent the endpoint of the observation apparatus. That is the first panel is isolated and the second panel has a detector measuring the path that the scientist then looks at.
So yeah, "eyes" don't cause a waveform collapse. But how does a two panel cartoon with no words represent no interaction? First panel is blank?
On the other hand, maybe our personal observation doesn't just cause a waveform to collapse, but also collapses a logical path for said wave backwards into time. This would mean that even the results of the initial observation only collapse at the moment you look at them.
So at what point in human evolution was one human conscious enough to have the first observation and therefore spring quantum mechanics into existence in the universe?
What if both human evolution and "other humans" follow the same unfolding? You'd create all of that in every moment. Even the memories and logistics needed for that. That would mean that there is only now and reality has been creating itself over and over again infinitely.
So only scientists capable of observing create the entire universe from moment to moment? People who are extraordinarily stupid or just sleeping don't independently exist?
Being aware is literally observing. So we could all be creating it as a whole. Or it could be pure solipsism, and the sense of self (or the ego) is split into 8 billion different pieces all unfolding reality around each other. Infinity allows this. It's even possible that it's pure solipsism and everybody else is in superposition and you unfold literal human lives as you go.
In physics, the word observation means an interaction. An observation in physics does not mean a human with an arbitrary level of intelligence.
Obviously any living creature can become entangled with the quantum experiment if you build the right apparatus. Build a machine that kills a cat if an atom decays, and you've made cats into quantum observers. When the cat observes the experiment by not dying, it collapses from the cat's point of view. When you observe the cat, it collapses from your point of view.
If an interaction occurs it collapses for all points of view. The geiger counter is the observer.
Someone gets it
That's not "litterally" how it works then, just "figuratively".