Consciousness: blindspot of Physics

Consciousness is the primary issue in human life. Indeed, without consciousness, there are no other
issues. Consciousness and its corollaries are fundamental to every thought, word and action. Yet how
strange it is that no universally accepted, comprehensive theory of consciousness exists in Western
science. The reason for this is clear: until recently, science intentionally restricted its domain to
empirical investigations of the manifest objective world, while consciousness is intrinsically subjective and immanent.


However, without a practical theory of consciousness, science cannot adequately explain the world in
which we live. Consciousness is the most basic experiential fact of existence. Without a theory of
consciousness, Quantum Mechanics, in particular, and its other cousins in Physics have nowhere to turn but to mathematical theories of probability and chance to explain observations of subatomic energy transactions. Einstein famously expressed his discomfort with this by saying, “God does not play dice with the Universe.” Quantum Mechanics cannot predict the behavior of a quantum system until a macroscopic conscious entity interferes with it, decohering the indeterminate superposition of the quantum wave function into a definite classical result by the process of measurement and observation.

Clearly, Quantum Mechanics is missing something; just as clearly, what is missing is a workable theory of consciousness. The sometimes bizarre concepts and calculations of quantum theory all depend on the existence and actions of an observer. Any observer must be conscious, and therefore the consciousness of the observer is critical to the outcome of any quantum experiment. However, so far Quantum Mechanics still treats the observer’s consciousness as a ‘black box,’ as if consciousness were proscribed from serious scientific inquiry.


The role of consciousness in Quantum Mechanics is crucial; for as Schrödinger found, without exact knowledge of consciousness it is impossible to predict the outcome of any quantum transformation with better than probabilistic accuracy. The actual quantum state remains a mystery until decoherence of the Quantum Wave Function occurs when a conscious entity interferes with it by measuring a quantum phenomenon, either with the bodily senses or a technological extension of those senses. Thus it is impossible to understand the ontological implications and actual mechanism of quantum decoherence without extensive, detailed and deep knowledge of consciousness. In addition, Quantum Mechanics has no clear information on the Universal Quantum Wave Function itself, because like consciousness, it is empirically unobservable and therefore immeasurable by definition, being outside the ontological domain of manifested objective existence. Science knows of its existence and can estimate its properties only by mathematical inference.

It turns out that the sages of India have investigated the nature of consciousness in a great amount of detail about five thousand years ago in a quite systematic, complete and practical theory in literatute such as Vedanta sutra, Srimad Bhagavatam etc. These theories are quite compatible with Quantum Physics.  Schrödinger himself was motivated by Vedanta in forumulating his theories; see this link.   The material is presented in these texts in a quite non-dogmatic manner, with the rigour of modern Science. It is my hope that these texts can be studied by modern Physicists to improve our models of Consciousness.