3

I recently came across a theory from Japan that tries to rethink physics from the standpoint of the observer.

Instead of treating reality as something fully given “out there,” it suggests that reality may emerge when certain structural conditions of the observer are satisfied.

What I found interesting is that it reframes the gap between relativity and quantum mechanics as a problem about how the observer is defined.

Philosophically, it feels closely related to the question of whether observation is passive or constitutive of reality.

It’s summarized in a short video, so if you’re interested, I’d really appreciate your thoughts: https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/c714dc8c-eb93-4317-b369-8e57fac880fc?artifac

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 1 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

I think the video is pretty much garbage. "The correlation is 0.9"... Yeah, the correlation of WHAT? I'm pretty sure my brain is affected in exactly the same way by gravity as a quantum computer is a thousand miles away. It's subject to the same physics and quantum mechanics. The laws of physics are the same all across the universe. If I measure something which is subject to that, I could even get a correlation close to 1.0!

What I'm trying to say is: A brain and a quantum computer being part of the same universe isn't a mystery. The interesting question has to be deeper than what the video leads to believe. And then what's even with the geometric objects of manifolds of a brain EEG? And why is it important how it relates to another concept? The video doesn't explain any of that.

I mean we know about things like observer effect. And about quantum nonlocality. That being part of "the fabric of the universe" is a subject of science since Einstein's time?! It's not a "revolutionary" new idea. The video is phrased in a very sensational way. But it doesn't really say a lot.

And what's even with the second observer? The video entirely omits explaining the obvious connection via the observer.

So what's in the video more or less just reminds me of the "spurious relationship" effect. How we have higher drowning rates if ice-cream sales in the city are high. Or when a sports team predicted the presidential election results for decades. Sure. Once you do the methodology right, you can do some science on it. That's how science works. And maybe they're linked in a way. Maybe they're not. The video surely doesn't tell any of that.

this post was submitted on 04 Apr 2026
3 points (58.8% liked)

Philosophy

1819 readers
21 users here now

Discussion of philosophy

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS