First, it assumes that consciousness exists as an ontological unit. This isn’t just a problem with reductionism but is a problem with Occam’s razor. What precisely one means by reductionism can be complicated and subtle with some versions more definite or plausible than others. But regardless, there’s no good evidence that consciousness is an irreducible.
Second, it raises serious questions about what things were like before there were conscious entities. If no collapse occurred prior to conscious entities what does that say about the early universe and how it functioned? Note that this actually raises potentially testable claims if one can use telescopes to look back before the dawn of life. Unfortunately, I’ve never seen any consciousness causes collapse proponent either explain why this doesn’t lead to any observable difference or make any plausible claim about what differences one would observe.
Third, it violates a general metapattern of history. As things have progressed the pattern has consistently been that minds don’t interact with the laws of physics in any fundamental way and that more and more ideas about how minds might interact have been thrown out (ETA: There are a few notable exceptions such as some of the stuff involving the placebo effect.). We’ve spent much of the last few hundred years establishing stronger and stronger versions of this claim. Thus, as a simple matter of induction, one would expect that trend if anything to continue. (I don’t know how much inducting on the pattern of discoveries is justified.)
Fourth, it is ill-defined. What constitutes a conscious mind? Presumably people are conscious. Are severely mentally challenged people conscious? Are the non-human great apes conscious? Are ravens and other corvids conscious? Are dogs or cats conscious? Are mice conscious? Etc. down to single celled organisms and viruses.
Fifth, consciousness causes collapse is a hypothesis that is easily supported by standard human biases. This raises two issues one of which is not that relevant but is worth mentioning and the other which is very relevant. The first, less relevant issue, is that this means we should probably assume that we are likely to overestimate our chance that the hypothesis is correct. This is not however an argument against the hypothesis. But there’s a similar claim that is a sort of meta-argument against the hypothesis. Since this hypothesis is one which is supported by human biases one would expect a lot of motivated cognition for evidence and arguments for the hypothesis. So if there are any really good arguments one should consider it more likely that they would have been hit on. The fact that they have not suggests that there really aren’t any good arguments for it.
There are a variety of different issues.
First, it assumes that consciousness exists as an ontological unit. This isn’t just a problem with reductionism but is a problem with Occam’s razor. What precisely one means by reductionism can be complicated and subtle with some versions more definite or plausible than others. But regardless, there’s no good evidence that consciousness is an irreducible.
Second, it raises serious questions about what things were like before there were conscious entities. If no collapse occurred prior to conscious entities what does that say about the early universe and how it functioned? Note that this actually raises potentially testable claims if one can use telescopes to look back before the dawn of life. Unfortunately, I’ve never seen any consciousness causes collapse proponent either explain why this doesn’t lead to any observable difference or make any plausible claim about what differences one would observe.
Third, it violates a general metapattern of history. As things have progressed the pattern has consistently been that minds don’t interact with the laws of physics in any fundamental way and that more and more ideas about how minds might interact have been thrown out (ETA: There are a few notable exceptions such as some of the stuff involving the placebo effect.). We’ve spent much of the last few hundred years establishing stronger and stronger versions of this claim. Thus, as a simple matter of induction, one would expect that trend if anything to continue. (I don’t know how much inducting on the pattern of discoveries is justified.)
Fourth, it is ill-defined. What constitutes a conscious mind? Presumably people are conscious. Are severely mentally challenged people conscious? Are the non-human great apes conscious? Are ravens and other corvids conscious? Are dogs or cats conscious? Are mice conscious? Etc. down to single celled organisms and viruses.
Fifth, consciousness causes collapse is a hypothesis that is easily supported by standard human biases. This raises two issues one of which is not that relevant but is worth mentioning and the other which is very relevant. The first, less relevant issue, is that this means we should probably assume that we are likely to overestimate our chance that the hypothesis is correct. This is not however an argument against the hypothesis. But there’s a similar claim that is a sort of meta-argument against the hypothesis. Since this hypothesis is one which is supported by human biases one would expect a lot of motivated cognition for evidence and arguments for the hypothesis. So if there are any really good arguments one should consider it more likely that they would have been hit on. The fact that they have not suggests that there really aren’t any good arguments for it.