God as quantum observer

Today we will look at the intersection of quantum nonsense and terrible arguments for God.  How fun!

This argument is based on something Michio Kaku said to Deepak Chopra in an interview. It wasn't very clearly stated, so I'm filling in the blanks.

1. Quantum mechanics says that things do not exist unless there is an observer to observe them.
2. The universe exists.
3. There must be an omniscient conscious being to observe the universe.
4. That being is God.

 As with most arguments for God, the last step is troublesome, because there are all sorts of things the being could be.  There's no compelling reason to think that the object in question can appropriately be called "God", much less the Judeo-Christian god.  For example, why should we think that it's a single object observing the entire universe rather than multiple objects?  But since Deepak Chopra is not part of any western religion, he would skip step 4, thus avoiding the problem.  Unfortunately for him, the rest of the argument is crap too.

Rebutting the rest of the argument is really an exercise in applying the advice in my presentation on Quantum Mechanics for Skeptics.

Error #1: Elementary misunderstanding of what Quantum Mechanics actually says

According to step 1, things don't exist until we observe them.  This is incorrect.   Observation does not cause things to come into existence, it just causes a mixed state to become a definite state.  For example, if we have an electron in two places at once, and we observe its position, then it "collapses" into a single position.  The electron existed before you observed it.  The mixed state existed before you observed it.

Getting a little more advanced: Even after you observe an object, in some sense it's still in a mixed state.  This is because all states are mixed states.  So even if you mistakenly believed that "mixed state" = "does not exist", then you would be forced to conclude that nothing exists with or without observers.

Error #2: Misunderstanding observers

Step 1 just talks about observers, while step 3 suddenly jumps to conscious observers.  Observers do not need to be conscious.  The chair I'm sitting on functions as an observer.  A piece of white paper functions as an observer.  Anything with enough atoms to be visible to the naked eye probably functions as an observer.  When you realize the banality of observers, it makes much more sense to conclude that the universe is full of non-conscious observers, none of which need be omniscient.

Error #3: Misunderstanding quantum interpretations

This whole time we've been talking about observers.  But observers are specific to one interpretation of quantum mechanics, the Copenhagen interpretation.  Under many other interpretations, there is no such thing as an observer.

The thing is with quantum interpretations, they're all or nothing.  All interpretations make the same predictions.  Therefore, all of them predict God, or none of them do.  If you've formulated an argument that only works for the Copenhagen interpretation, but not for others, then this is a sign that you made an error somewhere.  I already showed errors in the argument, so the problem is resolved.

A summary:
#1: The universe does not need to be observed to exist.
#2: There are probably non-conscious observers all over the universe.
#3: A valid argument would make sense under all quantum interpretations, but this one does not.

I've also heard an argument from quantum mechanics that God does not exist.  It is also a crap argument.  I will cover it next time.