I challenged the universality of a claim ("everyone") and you have attempted to support it by selecting anecdotes. This is obviously a mistake. Not only that, the examples don't even claim what you say they do. Although the second example at least alludes to it none of them assumes that:
THE COPENHAGEN INTERPRETATION DOES [...] SAY THAT CONSCIOUSNESS COLLAPSES THE WAVEFUNCTION.
Say that some people are confused about what the Copenhagen Interpretation says, by all means. But if you are going to throw about grossly exaggerated accusations for the sake of emphasis then at least refrain from trying to defend them!
"Everyone" is an anaphor for the "people getting it wrong" mentioned in my first sentence.
the examples don't even claim what you say they do
They all affirm that (quoting myself) "the wavefunction is a real thing". So perhaps I should have shouted that part?
THE COPENHAGEN INTERPRETATION DOES NOT SAY THAT THE WAVEFUNCTION IS A REAL THING.
But then - although the Copenhagen interpretation features in Phil's first sentence - it's not ubiquitous in the discussions. So maybe I should just say
THE WAVEFUNCTION MIGHT NOT BE A PH...
Suppose you believe in the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. Schroedinger puts his cat in a box, with a device that has a 50% chance of releasing a deathly poisonous gas. He will then open the box, and observe a live or dead cat, collapsing that waveform.
But Schroedinger's cat is lazy, and spends most of its time sleeping. Schroedinger is a pessimist, or else an optimist who hates cats; and so he mistakes a sleeping cat for a dead cat with probability P(M) > 0, but never mistakes a dead cat for a living cat.
So if the cat is dead with probability P(D) >= .5, Schroedinger observes a dead cat with probability P(D) + P(M)(1-P(D)).
If observing a dead cat causes the waveform to collapse such that the cat is dead, then P(D) = P(D) + P(M)(1-P(D)). This is possible only if P(D) = 1.
If you don't say that only conscious agents can collapse waveforms, then you have to agree that something in the box collapses the waveform as seen from inside the box, while it's still uncollapsed to Schroedinger. And Schroedinger's opening the box collapses that waveform for him; but it is still uncollapsed for someone outside the room. This seems like it might be equivalent to many worlds - all possibilities already exist; you just haven't chosen which one you're going to access until you open the box.
But if you do say that only conscious agents can collapse waveforms, then it's something about their mental processes that does the collapsing. This could mean their beliefs matter. And then, the cat is always dead.
ADDED: People. Read the entire post before responding. I am not claiming that the cat is always dead. I am not claiming that consciousness collapses waveforms. I am claiming that there are only 2 known alternatives:
If you can't produce another alternative, and you don't believe in many-worlds, you owe me an upvote.
Finally, this post is supposed to be fun! You are crushing all whimsy and playfulness on LessWrong when you pile downvotes like bricks on anything playful because it does not provide a complete and satisfactory resolution.