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What did John Archibald Wheeler mean by the participatory anthropic principle?
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Anthropic principle
The Hubble Deep Field. This image, the result of 10 days' observation by the Hubble Space Telescope, shows 1,500 galaxies in different stages of their evolution.
The participatory anthropic principle (PAP) was proposed by the American physicist John Archibald Wheeler. He suggested that if one takes the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics seriously, one may conclude that observers are necessary to give the universe meaning, as no phenomenon can be said to exist until it is observed.1
This concept remains difficult to evaluate, as there is significant uncertainty regarding how, or if, the principles of quantum mechanics apply to the universe as a whole.1