I don't know who gets more excited about stuff like this: my inner geek, my inner shaman, or my inner Buddhist. I think I'll go with inner my Buddhist Lol Think of the ramification of this as applied to your meditation practice. Put's a different spin on Vipassana no less the experience of jhana. Or does it? LOL
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Pioneering Quantum Physics Experiment Finds Reality Doesn’t Exist Until You Look At It

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/reality-doesnt-exist-until-you-look-at-it-pioneering-quantum-physics-experiment-finds-10305047.html

So now we know the answer to that age old question: "If a tree falls in the forest, and no one is there, does it make a crashing noise."

Guess not! Ha ha ha!!!

But if no one was there to observe the fall, might not the tree still be standing?

There is no tree.... Oh there is now

There is no tree.... Oh there is now

We could make some great Zen Koans out of this stuff.

There is no tree, but 'look' and there is a tree.

There is a tree, but 'look' and there is no tree.

I like it!!!

i dont agree with his conclusion. the item always existed, it just hadnt decided in what form until observed. big difference

it depends completely on how one defines sound

All laws of science, whatever the discipline, exist only in the human mind, and the nature and quality of such laws are influenced by the nature and quality of the human mind.

A reality which is independent and separate from the mind, is a reality which we can know nothing about.

It is ego, pride, vanity, delusional thinking and ignorance, which lead many people to assume that what they perceive through their senses (sight, hearing, taste, touch and smell etc) and interpret through their brain, is actual and absolute reality.

A very simple analogy is the greenness of a leaf. We should all understand that the color green is just a sensation in the human mind. The leaf is not 'actually' green. It has a property of reflecting a particular wave length of light which the 'normal' human brain interprets as green. The color-blind person may not interpret the leaf as green, just as many different species of animal may not interpret it as green.

Just as the sensation of greenness of the leaf will vary according to the proportion of 'so-called green' wavelengths in the source of the light being reflected, that sensation of 'greenness' will also vary according to individual genetic make-up.

It's a great tragedy of the human condition that so many people who seem to have accepted what they have individually interpreted as an absolute and undeniable reality, will fight to the death to preserve that illusion.

Buddhism, at its deepest level, seems to have intuitively understood this issue, which is why I have such respect for the religion at a philosophical level.

There is also the question of intellectual awareness.

Let's say physically a tree has fallen. It would be through only human recognition that such an event happened.

Is the tree aware it has fallen? Does "nature" know it?

There may be cosmic events in and outside our four dimension universe (ie., black matter) which cannot be detected by the human intellect. But they are no less reality.

There is also the question of intellectual awareness.

Let's say physically a tree has fallen. It would be through only human recognition that such an event happened.

Is the tree aware it has fallen? Does "nature" know it?

There may be cosmic events in and outside our four dimension universe (ie., black matter) which cannot be detected by the human intellect. But they are no less reality.

To my way of thinking, such events which cannot be detected by human observation, cannot be real until they are observed or experienced in some way. They are matters of speculation only, like the existence of a creator God.

However, sometimes certain theoretical scientists have predicted that certain things should exist according to existing theories, then other scientists have begun searching for evidence of the predicted existence of such things.

Sometimes they succeed in their search, but often not. The famous physicist/mathematician, Paul Dirac, postulated in the late 1920's that antimatter should exist, according to the mathematical formulas related to quantum theory. His initial reaction was to keep silent about his hypothesis, in order to protect his own reputation. He knew that mathematics could sometimes lead one to absurd conclusions.

However, some friends persuaded Paul that someone else might arrive at a similar conclusion, sooner or later, and get the credit or reward for being the first to propose such a hypothesis, so Paul risked his reputation and delivered a lecture explaining why anti-matter should exist.

A few years later the existence of the positron was discovered (an electron with a positive charge), then progressively, over the years, other anti-particles were discovered, or detected.