The Universe as an Observer

Another metaphor has crept into physics through quantum mechanics and cosmology: the universe as an observer. One hears claims that “the universe is observing itself” or “the cosmos becomes conscious through us.” Such formulations project agency and subjectivity onto the totality of being, collapsing the distinction between systemic potential and human construal into a mystical ontology.

Relationally, observation is not a property of the universe. It is a perspectival act of construal — the cut that brings phenomena into being. To say that the “universe observes itself” is to erase this reflexive process and instead reify an anthropomorphic subject spread across the cosmos. It mistakes the conditions of meaning (our semiotic participation in constituting events) for the essence of reality.

This metaphor appeals because it flatters human intuition: if the universe observes itself through us, then we are its eyes, its consciousness, its purpose. But such talk veers toward theology, not physics. It replaces reflexive humility with cosmic narcissism.

The universe is not an observer. It is the open potential from which phenomena are carved. Observation is our symbolic participation in that process, never a property of the whole. To collapse these distinctions is to mystify physics with metaphysical projection. What needs to be preserved is the cut: the recognition that construal is perspectival, situated, and collective — not the voice of the cosmos looking back at itself.