What Is the Observer Effect?

Transcript

In quantum mechanics, the act of observation changes the outcome. Take a particle. Until it's observed, it exists in a cloud of probabilities. Once measured, it collapses into a single state, but only because someone looked. The observer effect challenges the idea that reality exists independently of us.

It suggests that consciousness and observation are tied directly to the physical universe. This might not just be a strange quirk of physics. It could be fundamental to understanding reality itself. This is Black Hole One. Subscribe to explore the edge of physics.