"In the beginning there were only probabilities. The universe could only come into existence if someone observed it. It does not matter that the observers turned up several billion years later. The universe exists because we are aware of it." -Martin Rees

For argument’s sake, let’s assume what Rees is saying is true. So when man first became aware, mankind’s history, which existed only in a state of probabilities, collapsed into an actual evolutionary history. In other words and as bizarre as it sounds, it seems to me if what Rees is saying is correct, then the process of evolution didn’t cause the emergence of a being capable of awareness, but instead, a being capable of awareness caused the emergence of the evolutionary process.

I don't get this. So we were aware of ourselves before we even existed??? Is that what he's saying?

As far as quantum mechanics is concerned I don't think an observer has to be conscious or living.

If by 'observer' Rees is strictly referring to a concious or living entity then he's talking nonsense.
The universe exists regardless of whether we're aware of it or not. How does he explain the way in which the planets formed? the first consciously aware fish gave birth to gravity? Ludicrous.

His credibility goes way down by his involvement in this:

http://www.amazon.ca/Vanishing-Face-...7949446&sr=1-4

D.

'If a tree falls in the woods....' taken to a ridiculous extreme, imo. He's basically saying the forest didn't exist until we 'saw' the tree.

From the wiki entry on criticisms of the consciousness causes collapse interpretation:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum...blem#Criticism
To many scientists this interpretation fails a priori to compete with other interpretations of quantum mechanics because "consciousness causes collapse" relies upon a dualistic philosophy of mind, which contradicts the materialist monism presupposed by many physicists. They point to the main philosophical argument against Cartesian dualism, namely the problem of how consciousness and matter might interact. Some physicists conclude that science's success at modeling the world materialistically—without reference to the existence of mental substances or mental properties—vindicates the idea that consciousness and subjectivity are wholly reducible to objective brain matter, and justifies the widespread belief among physical scientists in a strictly materialist account of metaphysics.

A more fundamental issue is that it posits an important role for the conscious mind, and it has been questioned how this could be the case for the earlier universe, before consciousness had evolved or emerged. It has been argued that "[consciousness causes collapse] does not allow sensible discussion of Big Bang cosmology or biological evolution, at least on the assumption of an atheistic universe.

Since theists aren’t monist materialists, don’t believe consciousness is wholly reducible to brain matter and don’t assume an atheistic universe, I don’t see how or why the objections apply to a theist worldview. For the theist who believes God is outside the quantum mechanically described material universe, I would say that if true, God could observe man “in His image” and basically give rise to the past history of the world leading up to omega-state of man God envisioned. Which, since the statistical applecart isn’t overturned, the entire process from the big bang to the present, would appear entirely random.

As far as the observation, I think an observation is ultimately predicated on awareness, otherwise we’re giving some other measuring system special status outside the QM described physical/material universe. I think the main objection is that awareness itself is considered by reductionists as a physical mechanistic system itself, and hence, doesn’t separate itself or isn’t separate from the system its describing. To me, though, awareness isn’t something that parallels time or something that occurs in time; awareness, at least experientially, seems to run perpendicular to time, intersecting time’s arrow in the ‘now’. From which I think an observation occurs only in the now, in awareness, which no physical system or materialistic accounting can really define or describe.

There is nothing in the physical theory of quantum mechanics that talks about dualism or souls or conscious creatures interacting or whatever. If someone is a dualist, they can prescribe some philosophy if they wish and there can be analogies to quantum mechanics if they wish. But please, please, don't let us use the physical theory of quantum mechanics and then wave our hands and act as if it has any iota of meaning in some philosophical dualistic sense. Call it something other than quantum mechanics if you must speak in these terms.

I don't think this construct is that much different from one I proposed not long ago--
That God created man because God heard man crying out to Him for existence.
Or God heard the first man to ever express thankfulness for existing.
If God is timeless, and everywhere at all times, and nothing escapes Him, then this idea is not all that ridiculous.
Why did God create man?
Because man wanted to exist.
God heard man, and saw man yearning for Him.

I'm often surprised by the atheists inability to grasp this possibility.

But am just as frustrated and baffled as, say, yoda's stubborn resistance to theistic evolution.

I think most understand that QM is just a mathematical algorithm that may not have any ontological import whatsoever; so any ‘interpretation’ is speculative to that extent. And if they don’t understand quantum theory as such, I think it has less to do with posts like mine or the quote from Rees, and more to due with the plethora of pop science books, mainly written by scientists, who fail to make the distinction clear or make it sound as if it’s a fact that reality is quantum to help bolster whatever theory said scientist is promoting. I do find it ironic, though, that when such speculation is entailed in a naturalist accounting of the universe, there’s no cry of foul, yet when the same degree of speculation veers into theological or mystical views, then it’s treated as some great affront to almighty science.

If on one hand someone is criticizing theist belief for lack of proof and then on the other accepting as a foundational axiom for his worldview something like “The universe exists regardless of whether we're aware of it or not,” which likewise cannot possibly be proved and consequently must be assumed or taken on faith, then I just take it as pot calling the kettle black sort of stuff. I think theists are just more attuned to the issue because it’s their belief that is being challenged by the atheist. But I think what a lot of atheists don’t understand is that part of the reason theists are theists is because they find a naturalistic accounting wanting in itself, or they simply find another explanation more plausible. In other words, while I think the atheist is correct when he says the theist case isn’t compelling and requires speculation and assumptions, the alternative isn’t really any more compelling, less speculative or lacking assumptions, IMO.

Yes, because scientists just 'go with the norm' and promote various theories that other prominent scientists promote.....

There are just so many things wrong in the above paragraph that I don't even know where to begin.

There's no theory of consciousness at anything like the right level of abstraction to be integrated with quantum mechanics. So, as things stand, there's really nothing to say here.

There is plenty to be said if one assumes Rees’s hypothesis is true, which is all I was asking. However, as I argued in another thread, “that materialistic realism is so well entrenched in the scientific community that alternative views are more often than not dismissed out of hand,” we shouldn’t expect much help from the scientific community if reality is in fact as Rees proposes.

http://henry.pha.jhu.edu/aspect.html
Alain Aspect is the physicist who performed the key experiment that established that if you want a real universe, it must be non-local (Einstein’s “spooky action at a distance”). Aspect comments on new work by his successor in conducting such experiments, Anton Zeilinger and his colleagues, who have now performed an experiment that suggests that “giving up the concept of locality is not sufficient to be consistent with quantum experiments, unless certain intuitive features of realism are abandoned.”

Be clear what is going on here. Quantum mechanics itself is not crying out for such experiments! Quantum mechanics is doing just fine, thank you, having performed flawlessly since inception. No, it is people whose cherished philosophical beliefs are being threatened that cry out for such experiments, exactly as Einstein used to do, and with exactly the same hope (we think in vain): that quantum mechanics can be refined to the point where it requires (or at least allows) belief in the independent reality of the natural world it describes.

Quantum mechanics makes no mention of reality (Figure 1). Indeed, quantum mechanics proclaims, “We have no need of that hypothesis.” Now we are beginning to see that quantum mechanics might actually exclude any possibility of mind-independent reality and already does exclude any reality that resembles our usual concept of such (Aspect: “it implies renouncing the kind of realism I would have liked”). Non-local causality is a concept that had never played any role in physics, other than in rejection (“action-at-a-distance”), until Aspect showed in 1981 that the alternative would be the abandonment of the cherished belief in mind-independent reality; suddenly, spooky-action-at-a-distance became the lesser of two evils, in the minds of the materialists.

Why do people cling with such ferocity to belief in a mind-independent reality? It is surely because if there is no such reality, then ultimately (as far as we can know) mind alone exists. And if mind is not a product of real matter, but rather is the creator of the illusion of material reality (which has, in fact, despite the materialists, been known to be the case, since the discovery of quantum mechanics in 1925), then a theistic view of our existence becomes the only rational alternative to solipsism.

- Prof. Richard Conn Henry


“Someone who has learned to accept that nothing exists but observations is far ahead of peers who stumble through physics hoping to find out 'what things are'. If we can 'pull a Galileo,' and get people believing the truth, they will find physics a breeze. The Universe is immaterial.” – Prof. Richard Conn Henry

I don't understand what you are saying and to me it sounds like you are mixing up the creation of the universe and evolution which have nothing to do with one another.