Everybody keeps getting the Schrödinger's cat experiment 100% backwards. It was created by Schrödinger to highlight how absurd the interpretation of quantum mechanics was at that time.
Since then, even the Copenhagen interpretation basically says that the "observation" happens already at the Geiger counter:
"Analysis of an actual experiment found that measurement alone (for example by a Geiger counter) is sufficient to collapse a quantum wave function before there is any conscious observation of the measurement"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger%27s_cat#Copenh...
Consciousness might be worth thinking about. If it exists independently of the brain, it still must have effects on the brain, to have effects on human actions. These effects on the brain could be measurable. "This voltage here went up for an unknown reason".
Further, it pushes the question to another unobservable "magical" world. So, the consciousness exists in another world which is not directly measurable. Can we measure it indirectly? What is the structure of consciousness in the astral plane or however you are going to call it? If the whole goal of arguing that the consciousness exists in the astral plane is that "we can't study it", then that sounds a bit non-serious.
I once had a friend who described a RPG scenario in a world in which "science doesn't work". My response was, "Wait, science is, by definition, figuring out, by whatever means, what works and what does not, whatever that means." Postulating that science doesn't work, or that "we can't study it", is going to result in a radically odd universe.
The cat experiment is a simplification. It doesn't matter that it was created to show the absurdity. People are not getting it wrong.
All you need to know at the end is that the bigger / more energy a system has, the less time it can stay superimposed before collapsing by itself into one state. For anything macro-scale this timeline is basically zero.
Since then, even the Copenhagen interpretation basically says that the "observation" happens already at the Geiger counter: "Analysis of an actual experiment found that measurement alone (for example by a Geiger counter) is sufficient to collapse a quantum wave function before there is any conscious observation of the measurement" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger%27s_cat#Copenh...
Consciousness might be worth thinking about. If it exists independently of the brain, it still must have effects on the brain, to have effects on human actions. These effects on the brain could be measurable. "This voltage here went up for an unknown reason".
Further, it pushes the question to another unobservable "magical" world. So, the consciousness exists in another world which is not directly measurable. Can we measure it indirectly? What is the structure of consciousness in the astral plane or however you are going to call it? If the whole goal of arguing that the consciousness exists in the astral plane is that "we can't study it", then that sounds a bit non-serious.