Can Brain Responses to Quantum Signals Determine True Quantum Interpretation?

[john taylor]

Is it possible to solve the problem of which quantum mechanical interpretation is true, by sending the brain super imposed quantum mechanical signals. The individuals, perception of the signals, could identify which interpretation is correct. Could, an experiment of some sort be formulated with the objective of determining the legitimacy of the interpretations?

 

[Vanadium 50]

1) No

2) I don't think you even have a testable question there.

 

[PeterDonis]

Is it possible to solve the problem of which quantum mechanical interpretation is true, by sending the brain super imposed quantum mechanical signals.

No, because all interpretations make the same predictions for all experiments. They just tell different stories about what is going on behind the scenes.

In the case you describe, all interpretations predict that the person whose brain is sent the quantum signals in some superposed state (superposed with respect to some particular known observable in the brain) will experience one of the individual terms in the superposition (the one corresponding to the eigenstate of the observable that the person observes). Some interpretations (the collapse ones) will say that this is because the process of observation collapsed the superposition. Others (the no collapse ones) will say that the brain's state became entangled with that of the quantum signal, so there is now a superposition of multiple terms, each one corresponding to the signal being in a particular eigenstate and the brain observing that eigenstate--but each term corresponds to a different "world" (or whatever the particular interpretation calls it), and the worlds don't interfere, so no particular copy of the brain observes the signal being in a superposition of eigenstates. But there will be no way to tell from the results of the experiment which interpretation is correct.