It has frequently been claimed, e.g. by De Witt 1970, that the MWI is in principle indistinguishable from the ideal collapse theory. This is not so. The collapse leads to effects that do not exist if the MWI is the correct theory. To observe the collapse we would need a super technology which allows for the “undoing” of a quantum experiment, including a reversal of the detection process by macroscopic devices. See Lockwood 1989 (p. 223), Vaidman 1998 (p. 257), and other proposals in Deutsch 1986. These proposals are all for gedanken experiments that cannot be performed with current or any foreseeable future technology. Indeed, in these experiments an interference of different worlds has to be observed. Worlds are different when at least one macroscopic object is in macroscopically distinguishable states. Thus, what is needed is an interference experiment with a macroscopic body. Today there are interference experiments with larger and larger objects (e.g., fullerene molecules C70, see Brezger et al. 2002 ), but these objects are still not large enough to be considered “macroscopic”. Such experiments can only refine the constraints on the boundary where the collapse might take place. A decisive experiment should involve the interference of states which differ in a macroscopic number of degrees of freedom: an impossible task for today’s technology. It can be argued, however, that the burden of an experimental proof lies with the opponents of the MWI, because it is they who claim that there is a new physics beyond the well tested Schrödinger equation.
From the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,