Sign up to see the future, today
Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech
You might believe you’re the main character in your story. But according to Vlatko Vedral, a physicist from Oxford, it’s more accurate to say you’re like a puppet, with countless strings leading into parallel universes at any moment.
In a recent piece for Popular Mechanics, Vedral critiques the popular interpretation of the “observer effect.” Traditionally, it suggests that merely observing or measuring something influences that system. The narrative typically unfolds like this: quantum particles exist in various states until an observer looks at them, at which point they collapse into one state. This can lead to some far-fetched ideas, like the notion that we create reality just by observing it.
However, Vedral contends that physics doesn’t back this up. Instead, it’s not a kind of power exclusive to human consciousness that causes the collapse; it’s simply a fundamental aspect of physics that asserts any interaction compels a quantum system to choose a specific state.
Take, for instance, a photon striking your sunglasses. It’s not idly waiting for your brain to register its presence. The photon either gets absorbed or reflects off, depending on various factors. Crucially, your awareness isn’t influencing its trajectory. Rather, Vedral argues, the path of that photon has an impact on you: the version of you that registers that particular photon is distinct from the version that doesn’t.
If you extend this idea, things can quickly become overwhelming. But at its heart, Vedral’s point is that both versions of “you” continue to exist concurrently—although the “you” that consciously perceives the light inevitably follows a different quantum route than the “you” that doesn’t.
“Without too much exaggeration, it’s fair to say that all quantum experiments are really just more or less complicated versions of Schrödinger’s,” Vedral claims.
With every tiny interaction branching out into its own parallel universe, there are countless versions of “you” emerging constantly, while the observable “you” seems to be left holding the bag. Vedral notes that “the elements of reality encoded into quantum objects are fundamental, and you—both in this reality and others—are molded with each observation.”
So, in summary: somewhere out there, a cooler, more fortunate version of you is probably living their best life—while the you reading this has, it seems, drawn the short straw.
More on physics: Outer Space Is a Viscous Fluid, New Paper Claims
