Choices and Anti-Choices

Bob (1) is literally at a crossroads. But he’s been driving this road to work for years, and he’s never seen anything like this before. Where did it come from?Puzzled, he pulls over, gets out, and looks at the unexpected: the road, just an ordinary stretch of asphalt cutting through the valley between the mountains, has split in two. There are now two paths in front of him, each going in a different direction. Bob can’t quite grasp how much the road has changed, but he has to make a choice. With few clues, he gets that one fork leads to the world he knows—the predictable, the familiar. The other fork leads into the unknown.

Who or what determines which choices carry enough weight to change our existence?

So Bob has three choices: right, left, or no choice at all. But with each choice comes an anti-choice, like matter and antimatter (2). Hugh Everett’s Many-Worlds Theory (3) says that each choice creates a new dimension where the anti-choice exists. Everett (4), a quantum physicist, originally developed this theory to explain subatomic particles. Put in a Sci-Fi context, it becomes the basis for the multiverse: a sprawling web of multiplied identities, individuals, and choices. But if we accept this as plausible, we must also face a disturbing implication: not all choices are equal. Only certain choices seem to have the “power” to split reality and create new universes. This raises a haunting question: who or what determines which choices carry enough weight to split existence itself?

Many-Worlds Theory

According to Everett, whenever a particle exists in a superposition of states (such as “spin up” and “spin down”) (5), the universe splits into two distinct realities: one in which the particle takes one state and another in which it takes the other. In short, each time we measure the spin of a particle, we observe one outcome, but a parallel world is created in which the “unobserved” outcome also exists. This theory is all about probabilities, since no one has ever directly observed these alternate worlds. Nevertheless, the implications are both fascinating and staggering. Every quantum event—here referring to the subatomic realm—creates a split, spawning a potentially infinite number of parallel universes. But how do we, as individuals immersed in the macroscopic world, fit into this picture?
What if our choices also follow a similar pattern?

Choices and the “Quantum Weight" of Consciousness

The whole idea came to me while chatting with a colleague over lunch. We were joking about what would have happened if we hadn’t decided to have Italian pasta that day. Nothing, I guess, right? It’s not exactly a life-changing decision. Not every choice we make carries the same weight. Choosing coffee over tea for breakfast probably won’t “split the universe”. But changing jobs, moving to a new city, confessing your love?
Let’s take a concept from quantum physics and try to explain it: “Potential energy”(6). If we go back to the old-school way of thinking about atoms, with the center and the circles around it, an electron needs a certain minimum amount of energy—a quantum of energy—to jump from one orbit to another. If it doesn’t reach that threshold, it just stays put.
Maybe decisions work the same way. A decision may have to reach a certain level of “mental energy” or “consciousness energy” to cause a split in the universe. The more “quantum weight” a choice requires to shake things up and create a parallel world, the more thought, emotion, or courage it requires.

A touch of science fiction: How do we measure the energy of choices?

Now for the fun part: how could we actually measure this so-called “energy of consciousness”? Imagine a Sci-Fi gadget called the “Quantum Consciousness Meter”. This sleek little device could measure the “decision potential” behind every choice we make and calculate whether it’s powerful enough to trigger a new universe split. This meter could show us that everyone has a kind of “quantum energy budget” that changes based on things like emotions, stress levels, or how conscious we are in the moment. Perhaps decisions made during deep meditation or under intense emotional pressure have the greatest impact. Those moments when your heart races and your mind feels alive? They may be the ones that shape the multiverse. The whole thing is a bit Sci-Fi, but it’s not totally out there. Here’s something to think about: don’t you think the people running social media are already calculating our “emotional energy”? (7)

So, can we measure the energy of choices?

As far as I know, no—it’s just a science fiction idea. Many-Worlds Theory doesn’t actually say anything about human choice, and the connection between consciousness and quantum mechanics is still unclear, unexplored, and quite controversial. But the idea of giving “weight” to choices can be a narrative cue, a powerful metaphor. It makes us think about how some choices can change everything while others don’t make much of a difference. Some choices are powerful flames, burning everything they touch, while others are more like subtle ripples on a pond’s surface.

So what about Bob? He’s still on the fence about his next step.
Um… If you were Bob, would you choose the familiar, ordinary road, or the unexplored, mysterious one?

1 From Bob Coecke, a Belgian theoretical physicist and logician who currently serves as Chief Scientist at quantum computing company Quantinuum.

2 Matter comes in many forms: solids, liquids, gases and plasmas. These forms of matter are all made up of subatomic particles that give matter mass and volume. We can say that antimatter is the twin of almost all the subatomic particles that make up our universe. (DOE Explains...Antimatter)

3 In a quantum system, an electron is identified by a wave function (not an orbit), and this wave function is given by the superposition of the different possible states of the electron. From this principle we arrive at one of the most fascinating theories in quantum physics: Hugh Everett’s Many-Worlds Theory. Everett (1930-1982) was always fascinated by the problem of making measurements in a quantum system. He posed a question: If the entire universe is described by a single wave function, and if that wave function evolves according to Schrödinger’s equation, what should the measurement consist of? Well, he came to the conclusion that it is not necessary to measure, because in a quantum system things interact with each other all the time. A quantum system and the measurer are in entanglement, that is, the state of the system at the time of the observation evolves into a superposition of possible results. The measurement of a spin is relative only to the entanglement between the electron and the observer, but all other possible states of the measurement continue to coexist, and to be present they must have a “place” (or quantum system) in which to exist. Simply put, for Everett, all possible results contained in a wave function are actualized, but each in a different copy of the universe, isolated from the others and completely self-sufficient. (Everett’s Many Worlds and the "copies of yourself" you will never meet. Or will you?)

4 After his now celebrated theory of multiple universes met scorn, Hugh Everett abandoned the world of academic physics. He turned to top secret military research and led a tragic private life. The Many Worlds of Hugh Everett

5 “Spin up” and “spin down” refer to the two possible orientations of an electron’s intrinsic angular momentum, or spin. This property is a fundamental quantum characteristic of electrons, similar to their mass and charge.

6 Electrons have potential energy when they're spinning around a nucleus, which is a key idea in atomic physics. This potential energy comes from the electrostatic interaction between the negatively charged electron and the positively charged nucleus.

7 In her essay, Online Networks and Emotional Energy, Patricia Maloney talks about Collins’ theory of interaction. She says that we can understand how people generate emotional energy by looking at how they interact on those websites. Galen Thomas Panger also wrote an interesting essay on this topic. You can find it here: Emotion in Social Media.