Talk:Quantum suicide and immortality

Lead section conveys almost no information

From reading the lead section, all I know is that this is about a thought experiment and that it involves quantum mechanics.

Some more specific concerns:

• "Quantum suicide is a thought experiment in quantum mechanics and the philosophy of physics." - This is fine as far as it goes, but insufficient. What kind of thought experiment? What are the subjects of the thought experiment?
• "Purportedly, it can falsify any..." - In the second sentence before even explaining what this is, we're already getting to its claimed applications.
• "Quantum immortality refers to the subjective experience of surviving quantum suicide." - Now we get a second phrase defined in terms of the first without a definition of the first.
• "Hugh Everett did not mention quantum suicide or quantum immortality in writing" - The second section starts with this phrase... this really makes me think that this article is a rebuttal to the actual Wikipedia article. Can we get that one instead? Who is Hugh Everett and why is what he DIDN'T say relevant?
• "The quantum suicide thought experiment involves a similar apparatus to Schrödinger's cat – a box which kills the occupant in a given time frame with probability one-half due to quantum uncertainty. The only difference is to have the experimenter recording observations be the one inside the box. The significance of this is that someone whose life or death depends on a qubit could possibly distinguish between interpretations of quantum mechanics. By definition, fixed observers cannot." - Start of the 3rd section. Definitely should have led with this!

I'd suggest re-writing the intro as:

Quantum suicide is a thought experiment in quantum mechanics and the philosophy of physics which involves a similar apparatus to Schrödinger's cat–a box which kills the occupant in a given time frame with probability one-half due to quantum uncertainty. In this variation the experimenter recording observations is the also the subject inside the box which could theoretically allow for differences between the interpretations of quantum mechanics to be observed.

"Quantum suicide and immortality/Archive 1" listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has identified a potential problem with the redirect Quantum suicide and immortality/Archive 1 and has thus listed it for discussion. This discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2022 December 30 § Quantum suicide and immortality/Archive 1 until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Regards, SONIC⁶⁷⁸ 06:26, 30 December 2022 (UTC)

Article problem at premise of Tegmark

The article was just nonsensical to me. I asked the reference desk about Tegmark's criteria on Sept 10 and didn't get much help, so I read Tegmark's original paper in full. Tegmark is fairly clear there and in follow-ups that he doesn't take the idea writ large particularly seriously, but more importantly, in the paper he seems to clearly indicate that the section is not so much a "test" of MWI (as it sure enough turns out not to be), but rather to reinforce his response to criticisms of MWI in previous sections (i.e. the subject of the paper), namely the subjectivist or "orthodox linguist" definitions of probability, as indicated in lines such as: "For those who feel that the word probability should only be used when there is true lack of knowledge, probabilities can readily be introduced by performing the experiment while the observer is sleeping...".

What bothers me with this WP article is that it is missing some premise about how humans work would make the notion quantum suicide/immortality make sense -- even if it's anti-materialist, it is making some kind of phenomenological claim, and still needs to state its premises. That Tegmark was explicitly referencing and criticizing (strictly) subjectivist probability interpretations (as applied to quantum phenomena) would actually make it make sense. But then I call into question whether many of responses that are being quoted here are being quoted faithfully. This would not be unusual for a lot of QM-cum-sci-fi topics. I'm asking first for a sanity check, however. SamuelRiv (talk) 21:08, 29 September 2024 (UTC)

Personally I think the article makes sense and is understandable (by far most of the article text is not mine, also), but I don't mean to imply that your criticisms must be invalid - there may indeed be some philosophical aspects of probability, or other aspects, that could be added.

I remember when most of the text was added, and I have no reason to think the sources are being misrepresented - if anything it seemed to be motivated by debunking "sci-fi" misunderstandings. Some people on parts of social media seem to think this would seriously work in real life, either as an experimental set-up, or even to escape death in general; a few even that they already escaped death by this means. Crossroads ^-talk- 18:46, 30 September 2024 (UTC)