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What is an observer? (fedia.io)
submitted 6 months ago by to c/qubits@mander.xyz
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What is an observer?

We have long assumed that “an observer observes the world.”

But what if—

observation itself is not something we do, but something that only appears when certain conditions are met?

Two independent systems align only at specific moments.

Yet this alignment cannot be explained by causality, correlation, or measurement.

So who is observing?

Or rather—

does the observer emerge only when observation becomes possible?

Summary 👇 https://docs.google.com/document/d/19nDAJ_9MgrUFv4Ggyd9yvZIy4YCH9EqSlVOZPr_VuPs/edit?usp=drivesdk

What do you think about this perspective?

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[–] 3 points 6 months ago (6 children)

An observer is a means of taking measurement.

The things being measured are so small the means to measure such things greatly disrupts what they would be if not being measured. Think equal and opposite reactions.

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  • [–] 1 point 6 months ago (5 children)

    I'm wondering if it is that simple. Does the observer needs to have a "consciousness" ? Is a photon colliding with an atom is consider as the observer, or is it the scientist that lighted up the atom which is the observer ?

    If we takes Schrödinger cats, when does the measure happen ? When the sensor detect the radioactive particle ? When the cat realize its death ? When the box is open ? When someone actually looks inside the box ?

    That's true questions, I'm trying to understand quantum physics since years, but the sources I find are either too simple ("The cat is both dead and alive, It means there are parallel universe !), either too complicated (directly jump to equations).

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  • [–] 3 points 6 months ago (3 children)

    Well. Philosophically, many might argue that. The classic, "if a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"

    The materialist in me would say certainly. Mechanical sound waves exist independently of your, or anyone, hearing them. And indeed, if we set up a camera in the woods and capture the tree falling, the microphone will hopefully clearly capture the sound as the lens does the image.

    You must remember when you're playing with quantum you're playing probabilities. No guarantees.

    I read a study not too long ago where they claimed to measure the photonic wake (like on a lake) and they could tune the strength of detection with the interference pattern and were able to get a gradient between full interference and none based on the resonance of the detector.

    So that kind of throws a wrench into the box with the cat...

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 6 months ago (2 children)

    @fallaciousBasis@lemmy.world

    I think that perspective makes a lot of sense. Especially the idea that “sound exists independently of observation” is pretty strong within a classical physics framework.

    What’s interesting about this paper, though, is that it actually redefines the position of the observer itself. Instead of treating the observer as simply the one who measures—or as a device—it redefines the observer as a structure that makes the phenomenon of observation possible in the first place.

    So even the question, “If a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound?” gets reframed. It’s no longer about who is observing, but about under what structure reality itself becomes established.

    This also connects to the probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics. In this framework, observation isn’t just about “reading out a result”—it’s the process by which possibilities become actualized as reality.

    That’s why experimental results where interference changes continuously don’t have to be interpreted as “strength of observation.” Instead, they can be understood as how fully the conditions for an observational structure are satisfied.

    Even Schrödinger’s cat shifts meaning here. It’s less about “what’s inside the box” and more about at what point we consider reality to be fixed.

    That’s a pretty big departure from the conventional idea of “observation = measurement.”

    By the way, this is exactly what that paper is getting at— it redefines the observer not as a measuring agent, but as a structure. Even things like interference and detection strength are treated in terms of conditions for that structure, rather than degrees of measurement.

    https://www.researchgate.net/publication/398259486_Empirical_Subjectivity_Intersection_Observer-Quantum_Coherence_Beyond_Existing_Theories_Unifying_Relativity_Quantum_Mechanics_and_Cosmology

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 6 months ago

    @KissYagni@programming.dev

    Great question—this is exactly the issue the paper addresses.

    In standard quantum theory, “observer” is not formally defined, which is why it’s unclear whether measurement happens at interaction, detection, or perception.

    In this framework, measurement is not tied to consciousness or a single event. It occurs only when a coherence condition (SIC) is satisfied, fixing one outcome.

    So the question is not who observes, but when coherence becomes sufficient to determine reality.

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