[godelski]

This is true (Heisenberg uncertainty more says you can only get so much resolution in your measurement), but I was staying more general because there are other events that are random. Radioactive decay is completely random and isn't affected by an observer.

[cjslep]

That is because you don't actually observe the radioactive decay event; you observe it's byproducts. And the presence of an observer of those byproducts certainly changes their behavior (attenuation/scattering, energy, absorption depending on detection method) as opposed to if there were no observer looking at that byproduct.

[godelski]

I was more referencing the actual event of decay. Sure, the byproducts exhibit the standard quantum effects. the byproducts are particles after all.

And just to be clear, you do not think an observer has to be a conscious being, right? I only ask because pop culture science gives this impression. A photon can be an observer.