Does reality require an observer?

Benj96

It’s difficult to imagine anything in reality being significant or measurable without some aware entity to go “oooh!”. But if we go by evidence, life wasn’t always around and therefore there must be a cold dead universe that existed before it could be appreciated.

But there’s a few issues I have with fashioning this question. It has a lot of assumptions imbedded in it.

For example an observer is not external to reality. We are intrinsic to it. We are one facet of reality that happens to register itself. So when the question is rehashed as “does reality require reality” the question becomes a bit pointless.

This is also applicable if the concept of observer-ship or awareness is either illusory and doesn’t really exist in any distinct sense from the rest of the interacting physical world or if awareness is fundamental to reality and physics.

I guess what I’m really asking is is there any objective discernible difference between the state of observing and the state of being observed. Are they entirely interchangeable. Is the rest of the universe simultaneously observing us just as we observe it?

Is “living” an actual unique state of the universe or is it simply fancy chemistry that we like to believe - from the inherent bias of being alive - as something special and different?

To others I am a part of their objective observable universe just as a chair or the sky is. I am outside of them. They cannot prove that I’m aware and alive like they feel themselves to be, I could be a hologram or robot for all they really know, we only adapt this trust based on our similarities and capacity to project feeling ie. empathise as well as the culture of classification that we built society on.

Wayfarer

there must be a cold dead universe — Benj96

From our perspective.

To truly imagine a universe with no observer, then you must imagine it from no point of view. Nothing within it is nearer or further, older or newer, closer or further away. Of course, if you realise what that means, then you will realise its impossibility.

That is exactly what we bring to the picture - a perspective, and perspective itself is fundamental.

(See this discussion.)

javi2541997

Is the rest of the universe simultaneously observing us just as we observe it? — Benj96

We do not know it yet. This a good question and an interesting debate. Liu Cixin, wrote a book about this issue called dark forest theory. This debate is all about if it is or not worhty to be obrserved by "others" in this vast universe. Check it out: The Dark Forest Theory and Paradox. I think you would like it.

Jack Cummins

↪Benj96

Rupert Sheldrake wrote a book called, 'The Sense of Being Stared At', which looks at the role which observation has on the observer. One aspect which may be relevant to your debate is the role of participant observation in the social sciences, with the idea being that one had to become part of some social structure in order to enter into the understanding of it from an outside, distanced point of view.

Wayfarer

Rupert Sheldrake wrote a book called, 'The Sense of Being Stared At', which looks at the role which observation has on the observer. — Jack Cummins

Yes, and he also wrote a brief essay on the reaction to his book amongst the intelligentsia, called 'the sense of being glared at.'

Pantagruel

But if we go by evidence, life wasn’t always around — Benj96

The scope of that evidence is tiny indeed, compared with the vast expanses of space and time of which we are aware.

180 Proof

It’s difficult to imagine anything in reality being significant or measurable without some aware entity to go “oooh!”. But if we go by evidence, life wasn’t always around and therefore there must be a cold dead universe that existed before it could be appreciated. — Benj96

A "cold UNDEAD universe" is more like it. Nature is a zombie and h. sapiens is the kind of zombie inhabitant which deludes itself that it is fundamentally not a zombie, or almost always "self-conscious, intentional". More prosaically, and taking the Mediocrity Principle much further than we'd like, h. sapiens is (one of countless?) confabulating maggot-species inhabiting an astronomically huge cadaver we call "universe" that is still in its throes of decomposing and cooling down. We are merely perspectival "observers" in so far as we are wholly immanent aspects, even an inestimable aggregate of micro-agents, of cosmological decay (i.e. increasing entropy). This maggotry is, perhaps, our function and our metacognitive greatness, and so, at least to an absurdist like me, pandeism (re: the cosmological decay of a cold "undead" universe) makes the most sense.

Heiko

↪180 Proof

You seem quite obsessed with the life/death and metamorphosis theme. What makes you speak of life and death in the first place?

180 Proof

↪Heiko

Obsessed? I just replied to the OP in terms, mostly metaphorical in this case, which I found were appropriate.

Heiko

↪180 Proof

Alright, then. Philosophy obviously did not succeed in developing a concept able to grasp "being". There is the unproven assumption the OP is "aware" as well as the unproven assumption the bricks in the wall are not. How should philosophy come any step further from that? In scientific terms it is easy to say what is alive and what is dead as there are strict criteria. So, given, calling the universe undead as there are only some things fulfilling the "living"-criteria holds, ignoring the problem where to draw lines between organisms and such (think of viruses), is the pure mental observer even "alive"? I guess it's not.

180 Proof

↪Heiko

Or maybe the 'animate/inanimate distinction' does not really matter – is not physically fundamental or metaphysically significant?

Heiko

↪180 Proof

How could it be insignificant to someone if "alive"or "dead" applies to him? How could it be insignificant if he /is/ alive or dead?

Alkis Piskas

For example an observer is not external to reality. We are intrinsic to it. We are one facet of reality that happens to register itself. — Benj96

Our bodies belong to (physical) reality. Our brain cannot observe. It can only handle signals --receive them, process them and transmit them. The "observer" is you, a spiritual being, an awareness (consciousness) unit, and therefore not part of reality. Observation requires attention and intention. The brain, which is indeed part of the physical world (universe) cannot do that.

This is also applicable if the concept of observer-ship or awareness is either illusory and doesn’t really exist in any distinct sense from the rest of the interacting physical world or if awareness is fundamental to reality and physics. — Benj96

You are aware of the physical world, aren't you? And you are or can be aware that you are or can be aware. Isn't that so? If yes, how can awareness be illusory and not existing? It is you, yourself. And if you think you are an illusion, well, I hope not! :grin:

is there any objective discernible difference between the state of observing and the state of being observed. Are they entirely interchangeable. Is the rest of the universe simultaneously observing us just as we observe it? — Benj96

I am not sure what you mean by "the state of being observed". Me observing and me being observed? And being observed by the physical universe? How can that be? I don't undestand this.
Also, I don't see how this is related to the question of your topic, namely, "Does reality require an observer?". Maybe I miss something. If you could explain it to me, esp. with an example, I could maybe be able to answer this question.

180 Proof

↪Heiko

I didn't say the distinction is personally insignificant.

Heiko

↪180 Proof

And metaphysically? Being dead has a notion of pure passivity. This seems fitting for an "observer". As for most of the universe.

180 Proof

↪Heiko

What's your point?

Heiko

↪180 Proof

I am just thinking about your undead universe and which insights applying that seemingly unusual predication may yield. If life is living, mind is dead.

A Christian Philosophy

↪Benj96

Hello.
Does reality require an observer? If by observer we mean a human being, and we believe in science that the universe is much older than the human species, then the answer is clearly 'no'. Am I missing something?

Also I think you nailed it by stating that the observer is itself part of reality. Since nothing comes from nothing, then the observer came from something else that is part of reality.

Cheshire

Your reality certainly requires an observer; it's participatory realism. The understanding that things are real and they are experienced from your point of view. What your point of view entails has been the subject of many poetic philosophical verses attempting to capture that unknown function. The most obvious is probably scale. Things are big and small relative to your concept of size.

Benj96

Does reality require an observer? If by observer we mean a human being, — Samuel Lacrampe

Not necessarily. I cannot say whether humans are the only “aware” or “conscious” agents. I would imagine that many animals and maybe plants and fungi are to varying degrees conscious - dogs, dolphins, elephants primates etc. And perhaps to a lesser extent lower life forms - worms bacteria etc. Reality seems to only acknowledge its own existence through the capacity to be aware. Without any conscious agent one would imagine reality would never know it had even manifested in the first place.

And if nothing is conscious in the universe how would the universe ever be a universe. There’s nothing to realise it exists.

Benj96

U

I am not sure what you mean by "the state of being observed". Me observing and me being observed? And being observed by the physical universe? How can that be? I don't undestand this.
Also, I don't see how this is related to the question of your topic, namely, "Does reality require an observer?". Maybe I miss something. If you could explain it to me, esp. with an example, I could maybe be able to answer this question. — Alkis Piskas

I mean that if “life” is in fact a false distinction from other inanimate chemistry and simply a very complex physical process that gives the impression of “self reference” or emergence of ego, then it stands to reason that awareness is just a product of chemical/energetic reactions. And if that is the case then perhaps all chemical interactions in the universe are to some degree observing the other ones. This is along the lines of Panpsychism where awareness is a fundamental property like space, time, matter etc

Benj96

Being dead has a notion of pure passivity. This seems fitting for an "observer". As for most of the universe. — Heiko

It’s interesting that you associate being dead with being passive. Because as I understand life itself is a mix of active and passive roles: for example photosynthesis can be seen as passive in the sense that where there is light there is automatic photosynthesis it’s not like plants can refuse to covert light into usable energy but also it is active in the sense that a plant requires a certain level of self organisation in order to carry out the process.

Also parasitism is passive for the host. They are merely being used as a commodity by the parasite. So I’m the same way perhaps being dead can be active. A star is not considered alive but it certainly has an active role in sustaining it.

I borrowed these perspectives from Yin and yang which focuses on the importance of active and passive couples in the interaction of all things. I do see how being dead is sort of like being on the bottom rung of the ladder of utilisation. When you are dead you are at the mercy of all that wants to use you matter and energy for their own devices

Benj96

To truly imagine a universe with no observer, then you must imagine it from no point of view. Nothing within it is nearer or further, older or newer, closer or further away. Of course, if you realise what that means, then you will realise its impossibility. — Wayfarer

Would this not suggest then that observation and “self- awareness” is a universal property. Which would suppose I guess that at the beginning - the singularity - there was observance. A single entity that is aware of its own singularity. Seems pretty theistic to me.

Then again I don’t think panpsychism is completely out of the realms of possibility. Perhaps awareness is a proportional function of organisation. And us as highly complex self replicating systems of inanimate chemicals are simply a high level of emergence of this fundamental ego

Heiko

A star is not considered alive but it certainly has an active role in sustaining it. — Benj96

Dying is no sufficient criterion for living, however. Plants are really special as they most often lack perceptible response to their environment. However there are plants seeking sunlight, they reproduce and even carnivore plants. Stars just happen.

A Christian Philosophy

[...] And perhaps to a lesser extent lower life forms - worms bacteria etc. — Benj96

In your view, what is the lowest form of being that is conscious? Is a rock conscious? If not, then the point remains: science says that rocks are older than any living being.

Banno

To truly imagine a universe with no observer, then you must imagine it from no point of view. — Wayfarer

Your approach is commendable.

An alternative would be to consider the universe from any point of view. That is, to consider the world in a way such that the particular perspective becomes irrelevant.

This is encapsulated in the Principle of Relativity - the laws of physics are the same for all observers.

It's encoded in talking in the third person.

It's one of the few ways in which talk of being objective makes sense.

Banno

To others I am a part of their objective observable universe just as a chair or the sky is. I am outside of them. They cannot prove that I’m aware and alive like they feel themselves to be, I could be a hologram or robot for all they really know, we only adapt this trust based on our similarities and capacity to project feeling ie. empathise as well as the culture of classification that we built society on. — Benj96

Sure, no proof. But you act as if other people are alive and aware, in the way you are. Indeed I would hope that even when you try to convince yourself otherwise, you fail. And were you to succeed, convincing yourself that those around you are mere shells and you are the only conscious being, I suspect you might quickly find yourself confined by those around you.

No proof; but acting otherwise leads quickly to complications.

No proof; but you posted to us, and we replied.

Some things don't get proved, but are nevertheless true.

Banno

The Dark Forest Theory and Paradox. — javi2541997

Daleks are loud. A species that sought to destroy every other species would also seek to be more powerful than any other species so that it can win any battle.

We'd notice.

Cheshire

An alternative would be to consider the universe from any point of view. That is, to consider the world in a way such that the particular perspective becomes irrelevant. — Banno

It seems like you could about build a philosophy on this alone. Interesting you said any and not all. Seeing something two or more ways at once wouldn't be a normal or obtainable way to see things. Could you take it a step further and say see what doesn't change between any perspectives. Or might that be too narrow?

Banno

Could you take it a step further and say see what doesn't change between any perspectives. — Cheshire

The truth.

:wink:

Cheshire

↪Banno

That would be my assessment as well.

Does reality require an observer?

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum!

Categories

More Discussions