Mind and Cosmos
139
What this suggests is that complexity—the hierarchical organization of different things existing in the same frame of reality and related in elaborate
ways—is an innovation which arose in the universe with the animal mind,
or more generally, with the introduction of life into the universe. For us, it is
second nature to perceive the universe as complex, diverse and interrelated. It
is hard to grasp that hierarchical organization in space and time is a specific
invention—a revolutionary cosmic novelty—which came to exist with living
creatures.
Why Do Things Exist?
The physicist Werner Heisenberg, one of the founders of the theory of quanta,
wrote in his book Physics and Philosophy that the concept of existence appears
to be quite straightforward, but this appearance is deceptive. In reality, the
question of existence is a tangled web that easily leads one astray. Why is that
so?
When it is asserted that a certain definite object X exists, what does that
imply? If it is firmly established that X exists, then the information which
specifies the location of X and its outlines must also exist. This information is
discerned by an observer. Thus, the fact that a specified entity X exists is not an
absolute in the universe at large, but rests on a claim made by an observer. As
explained in the previous paragraph, the claim consists of information which
the observer must possess in order to identify and point out the object. The
idea of singling out a particular object implicates an observer who creates the
information required to segregate the object from the background in which it
lies.
In the mind-independent universe there are no features, hence if an object is
embedded in a background, it is as completely melded with its surroundings as
the angel which Michelangelo saw embedded in the marble. There is nothing
inherent in the background to help find the desired object. An observer must
be in possession of a precise delineation of what he wants to lift out of the
context. A definite object does not exist in the absence of the information
required to locate and extract it. This, in turn, is the work of an observer, and
this implies that definite objects can only exist in terms of observers. In the
absence of observers, there are no definite, specific objects in the universe.
This is a familiar fact in fundamental physics. An electron which is not
observed does not exist as a particle, but only as a wave function conceived
as a wave of probabilities. The instant the electron is detected by a living
observer, the wave function collapses and the electron is a particle with position
139
What this suggests is that complexity—the hierarchical organization of different things existing in the same frame of reality and related in elaborate
ways—is an innovation which arose in the universe with the animal mind,
or more generally, with the introduction of life into the universe. For us, it is
second nature to perceive the universe as complex, diverse and interrelated. It
is hard to grasp that hierarchical organization in space and time is a specific
invention—a revolutionary cosmic novelty—which came to exist with living
creatures.
Why Do Things Exist?
The physicist Werner Heisenberg, one of the founders of the theory of quanta,
wrote in his book Physics and Philosophy that the concept of existence appears
to be quite straightforward, but this appearance is deceptive. In reality, the
question of existence is a tangled web that easily leads one astray. Why is that
so?
When it is asserted that a certain definite object X exists, what does that
imply? If it is firmly established that X exists, then the information which
specifies the location of X and its outlines must also exist. This information is
discerned by an observer. Thus, the fact that a specified entity X exists is not an
absolute in the universe at large, but rests on a claim made by an observer. As
explained in the previous paragraph, the claim consists of information which
the observer must possess in order to identify and point out the object. The
idea of singling out a particular object implicates an observer who creates the
information required to segregate the object from the background in which it
lies.
In the mind-independent universe there are no features, hence if an object is
embedded in a background, it is as completely melded with its surroundings as
the angel which Michelangelo saw embedded in the marble. There is nothing
inherent in the background to help find the desired object. An observer must
be in possession of a precise delineation of what he wants to lift out of the
context. A definite object does not exist in the absence of the information
required to locate and extract it. This, in turn, is the work of an observer, and
this implies that definite objects can only exist in terms of observers. In the
absence of observers, there are no definite, specific objects in the universe.
This is a familiar fact in fundamental physics. An electron which is not
observed does not exist as a particle, but only as a wave function conceived
as a wave of probabilities. The instant the electron is detected by a living
observer, the wave function collapses and the electron is a particle with position