[extropy-chat] Is Many Worlds testable?

[Damien Broderick]

At 02:45 AM 12/28/2006 -0500, JKC wrote:

>In the Deutsch test a conscious quantum computer shoots electrons at
>a metal plate that has 2 small slits in it. It does this one at a time.
>After leaving the plate the electrons hit some photographic film, but do not
>look at the photograph until later. The quantum mind has detectors near
>each slit so it knows which slit the various electrons went through.
>The quantum mind now signs a document saying that it has observed each
>and every electron and knows what slit each electron went through. It is
>very important that the document does not say which slit the electrons
>went through, it only says that they went through one slit and one slit
>only, and that the mind has knowledge of which slit.
>After the electrons pass the plate but before they hit the photographic
>film (just place the film a long way away to give you time)
>the mind then uses quantum erasure to completely destroy his memory
>of which slit the electrons went through.

This is probably a silly suggestion, but could a physicist do the 
observing directly, and then be dosed with Rohypnol or some other 
drug interrupting short term memory, preventing the memory of 
observation from going into long term storage? Or you could borrow 
that luckless neuro patient of Oliver Sacks who forgets everything 
from minute to minute, living in a timeless present. Of course you'd 
need to fire the electron to a detector in Mars orbit or something to 
get sufficient lag. (I assume quantum erasure requires something more 
drastic than simple interruption of memory, though.)

Damien Broderick