Most may be familiar with the thought experiment which was created to underline the problems with moving from quantum physics to macroscopic physics.

  The idea is that there is a cat in a box with a trigger that releases a poisonous gas. The trigger is set off by a radioactive decay which has a fifty percent chance of producing a particle which enables the mechanism. The state of the cat, as alive or dead is not known until the box is opened. Since the state is not determined until the box is open this creates the possibility of a live-dead cat before the box is opened.

In order to solve this problem generated in the thought experiment many have tried to come with a link between macro physics and quantum physics.

Roger Penrose came up with the idea of a non-computability when trying to decide whether equations could be written for all operations of the brain. He concluded that there is no way to write an equation why two persons with the same background and genetics have different likes and dislikes or for that matter why would likes or dislikes change over time. He called this non-computability.

From the most popular version or view of quantum mechanics

a)     the cat would be both dead/alive until observed or the box opened or

b)     if for some reason the cat got entangled with other quantum sources and therefore was caused to cohere into whatever state the cat was in .

In this subjective reduction (SR) version of quantum mechanics, this does not require consciousness but a subjective conscious observation or other quantum noise to pick a state. (Note here that if there is no consciousness acting to observe, the cat is caused to pick a state, a required act of consciousness on some level on the part of the cat)

Penrose, first, decided that there must be some reason for the cat to self-cohere (other than consciousness) other than quantum noise or the act of observation. He concluded that there was some threshold energy that had to be reached. For this he looked to Einstein’s General Relativity, which describes macrophysics very well, but which cannot describe things on the level of molecules for which we need quantum mechanics.

In the gray area where the two mix it is sometimes referred to as quantum gravity. He used a quantum gravity equation, that states the amount of time a quantum object can remain in multiple states is equal to Planck’s constant divided by its gravitational self-energy or mass. Thus the larger the object the less time it can occupy multiple ‘coherent’ states.

This understanding would require self-collapse or self-coherence of quantum states, just objective reduction or (“just OR”). He then went on to say that somehow the brain must orchestrate this collapse in order for non-computability to take place. This orchestrated objective reduction he felt took place in the brain. (Orch OR)

There is a reason for the move from SR (subjective reduction) to Orch OR (orchestrated objective reduction). The reason is that physicists are very uncomfortable with a conscious based reality. The implications are horrendous. If the ‘coherence’ of objects and events are consciousness based then they are by nature not objective. They are subjective as per the subjective reduction. If there subjective then there is no objective reality. This would mean that the universe, as it is, has to be based on the subjectivity of some consciousness. This is a problem for our science and our view of reality.

Our science believes that our consciousness is a manifestation of the activity of our brain. If there is an overall consciousness from which the reality is manifest, then from which brain is this activity coming? This is where our assumptions and our view of reality take us.

But we cannot deny that when a single photon is presented with two slits it proceeds through either or both simultaneously without splitting up. Whether or not we see it as having gone through either slit or both slits simultaneously depends on what we expect to see and therefore what we look for. It seems that what we look for we find.