Subjective universe

Subjective universe generally refers to a concept associating the existence of the universe with subjectivity. In particular, using quantum theory, the physicist Daegene Song has proposed that the universe must necessarily be subjective. He argues that subjective experience — including that of observing the universe, i.e., not the universe itself — is all that exists.
Argument
Song’s argument for the subjective universe, based on quantum theory, starts by identifying an observable with the reference frame of an observer. Based on this identification, the two-picture formulation of quantum theory, i.e., the Schrödinger picture and the Heisenberg picture, has a natural physical realization. As seen in Case I to the right: In the Schrödinger picture, it is the state vector, V, that is being rotated while the reference frame, C, stays still, while in the Heisenberg picture, it is the observable that is rotated by the same amount in the opposite direction. In both pictures, the observation would be identical. However, this fails when it is the reference frame itself that is being observed. As shown in Case II, the two-picture formulation in quantum theory cannot yield the identical observation. This unique phenomenon of observing one’s own reference frame occurs in consciousness.
Based on this result, Song argues that this problem arises because the two-picture formulation of quantum dynamics has an underlying assumption about the existence of the physical system, and it considers that the physical system is observed in terms of the relative difference between the reference frame and the state of the physical system. Therefore, in order to resolve the inconsistency shown in Case II, one has to abandon this assumption about the existence of the physical system. That is, it is only the experience of observing the state vector itself that exists, rather than the physical system that is represented by the state vector. This argument can be applied to the case for the state vector of the universe — i.e., it is only the experience of observing the state vector of the universe that exists, not the universe itself. The universe is therefore "subjective."

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