Consciousness, Quantum Mechanics, and the Limits of Scientific Objectivism

Quantum Physics [Submitted on 14 Apr 2026] Consciousness, Quantum Mechanics, and the Limits of Scientific Objectivism John B. DeBrota, Christian List Consciousness and quantum mechanics are among the most puzzling phenomena studied in the sciences. Some scholars suggest they are related, though others think this claim commits a "minimization of mystery" fallacy. The aim of this programmatic paper is to draw attention to a less widely discussed parallel between consciousness and quantum mechanics: both challenge the classical objectivist worldview of science. Under certain assumptions, they are each in tension with a package of metaphysical theses -- "non-relationalism", "non-fragmentation", and "one world" -- that jointly make up that worldview. This points to three distinct non-objectivist responses: the "relationalist", "fragmentalist", and "many-subjective-worlds" ones. We will map out their pros and cons. Comments: 36 pages, 1 figure, 1 table Subjects: Quantum Physics (quant-ph); History and Philosophy of Physics (physics.hist-ph) Cite as: arXiv:2604.14234 [quant-ph]   (or arXiv:2604.14234v1 [quant-ph] for this version)   https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2604.14234 Focus to learn more Submission history From: John B. DeBrota [view email] [v1] Tue, 14 Apr 2026 20:26:22 UTC (198 KB) Access Paper: HTML (experimental) view license Current browse context: quant-ph < prev   |   next > new | recent | 2026-04 Change to browse by: physics physics.hist-ph References & Citations INSPIRE HEP NASA ADS Google Scholar Semantic Scholar Export BibTeX Citation Bookmark Bibliographic Tools Bibliographic and Citation Tools Bibliographic Explorer Toggle Bibliographic Explorer (What is the Explorer?) Connected Papers Toggle Connected Papers (What is Connected Papers?) Litmaps Toggle Litmaps (What is Litmaps?) scite.ai Toggle scite Smart Citations (What are Smart Citations?) Code, Data, Media Demos Related Papers About arXivLabs Which authors of this paper are endorsers? | Disable MathJax (What is MathJax?)