Decoherence
The Schrodinger’s Cat thought experiment is, unless you are a supporter of Eugene Wigner, generally solved by citing Decoherence. The reasoning goes something like this: Instead of arguing that the intervention of a conscious observer causes the wave function of the quon to collapse; the interaction of the quon with its environment brings about Decoherence. Typically, this involves interaction with other quons and brings about a situation similar to the older idea of a collapsing wave function. No conscious observer is necessary for this, so the cat is not put into a state of superposition. However, cats the world over cannot heave a collective sigh of relief, as Brian Clegg suggests they might, because once in this box they will be either alive or dead at the end of the process.
Decoherence, it appears, can solve the cat problem, but does it raise another question of its own? It would seem to. Quons have been around for billions of years, presumably interacting with other quons in their environment. Why, then, has decoherence not caused the wave function collapse of every quon in the Universe, long ago?
NB. Quon = quantum particle.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quon
