A staggering experience suggests that multiple realities may exist at the same time

In a new article, researchers say that they have proven that two realities can exist at a time, at least as far as the quantum world is concerned.

To study their hypothesis, researchers from the Department of Experimental Physics at the University of Innsbruck in Austria have addressed one of the most confusing thought experiments in the world, called "the friend of Wigner. "

The experiment, named after its ancestor, the Nobel laureate physicist Eugene Wigner, was postulated in 1961 and involves two people observing the same thing – in this case, a photon.

When the photon is observed, it appears in a horizontal or vertical state, but according to quantum mechanics, before this observation is made, it exists in a state of "superposition", which means that it is at the times in both states – horizontal and horizontal. vertical.

In the Wigner experiment, a person from a laboratory observes the photon, sending it to the vertical or horizontal state, while Wigner, who is outside the lab, performs a simple test called "interference experiment" to prove that the photon is still in a state of superposition.

In the thought experiment, it is possible to prove that both observations, and therefore the two realities that they represent, are true simultaneously.

Although Wigner's friend has long been an intriguing thought experience, advances in quantum mechanics and physics have allowed researchers to test the theory – and that's exactly what Massimiliano Proietti's Heriot-Watt University of Edinburgh and his colleagues did.

Using six entangled photons – particles of light whose fate is linked – Proietti and his colleagues were able to replicate the results of Friend de Wigner.

Once observed, photons existed in a state of polarization, but during tests using interference experiments, it was concluded that photons still existed in a state of superposition.

The implications of the study not only confirm the long-debated experience, but challenge the fundamentals of how observations are made.

"The scientific method is based on facts, established by repeated measurements and agreed universally, regardless of who has observed them," says Proietti in an article published in the pre-printed newspaper AirXiv.

"In quantum mechanics, the objectivity of the observations is not so clear."

However, if these facts can neither be proven nor credible, nor both, as advocated by Proietti's work, then science itself may have to change.