# To what extent is conscience an illusion? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 5, 2015, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-what-extent-is-conscience-an-illusion/709068 "2015-01-05T22:03:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 54
**Author:** ![Hellestal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3ab097/32.png) [@Hellestal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hellestal)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2015, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-what-extent-is-conscience-an-illusion/709068/54 "2015-01-07T22:20:33Z")
> [@iljitsch](#): > > And to those saying the universe is deterministic: please tell me when the potassium-40 atoms in the banana I have here are going to decay. This question has already been addressed in the thread. > [@Hellestal](#): > > What’s the physics of our minds and our decisions? It’s physics as we know it. Just physics, nothing more. (Some people squeak “quantum” right about this point in the conversation, as if it meant something, but it really doesn’t. There are plenty of [deterministic interpretations of quantum mechanics](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretations_of_quantum_mechanics#Comparison_of_interpretations) including the MWI.) Anticipated and answered. We don’t have perfect knowledge. Our brains are much smaller than the universe. We cannot possibly know everything, including when your banana’s potassium-40 will decay. That is not an argument against determinism. A demonstration of our ignorance doesn’t decide between quantum interpretations. We’re ignorant of that answer in **every** quantum interpretation, both the deterministic and the non-deterministic. Yours is not a question that can divide one from the other. > [@Trinopus](#): > > Or, as I always ask, explain the mechanism by which those atoms know when to decay. Where is the information stored? What kind of “countdown timer” is involved? A burning fuse? A little clockwork thingie? How does it know what time it is now, and how does it compare it to “M-Microsecond?” In another thread, you claimed to be “almost certain” that the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics is correct. > [@What's the craziest thing you absolutely 100% believe?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-craziest-thing-you-absolutely-100-believe/690368/8): > > I’m almost certain I believe in the “many worlds” interpretation of quantum physics – in the most practical sense, that all possible historical time-lines are fully realized. But of course, the many-worlds interpretation is deterministic. [The purpose](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation#Interpreting_wavefunction_collapse) [of it](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretations_of_quantum_mechanics#Comparison_of_interpretations) [was to be](http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2011/12/05/on-determinism/#.VK2sZSf_R-s) [a deterministic alternative](http://physics.about.com/od/quantumphysics/f/manyworldsinterpretation.htm) [to Copenhagen](http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi2630.htm). If you are almost certain that it’s true, then you are by necessity almost certain that we live in a deterministic universe. To answer your question, using the same quantum interpretation that you have yourself stated is most likely to be true: the “countdown timer” is the (deterministic) evolution of the [universal wavefunction](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_wavefunction). > [@](#): > > The universal wavefunction or universal wave function is a term introduced by Hugh Everett in his Princeton PhD thesis[1] The Theory of the Universal Wave Function, and forms a core concept in the relative state interpretation[2][3] or **many-worlds interpretation[4][5] of quantum mechanics**. > > … > > Everett’s thesis introduction reads:Since the universal validity of the state function description is asserted, one can regard the state functions themselves as the fundamental entities, and one can even consider the state function of the entire universe. In this sense this theory can be called the theory of the “universal wave function,” since all of physics is presumed to follow from this function alone.[7]The universal wave function is the wavefunction or quantum state of the totality of existence, regarded as the “basic physical entity”[8] or “the fundamental entity, **obeying at all times a deterministic wave equation**.”[9] Emphasis added. There is, in fact, a decent chunk of physicists who believe this to be true. They claim that it’s the simplest interpretation that is cleared defined. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/to-what-extent-is-conscience-an-illusion/709068)._