> If it goes one way, the cat lives. If > it goes the other way, the cat dies.

No, that is wrong. The cat does not live or die. The cat is both alive and dead at the same time. This is why so many people have problems understanding quantum mechanics -- they don't seem to get the implications of a state being a probability. Schrödinger came up with his cat in an attempt to make the reality clear to other people, and yet many intelligent people misinterpret what Schrödinger's point was. It's important to get this right: the cat is both alive and dead. Both. If the scenario wasn't so extremely counter-intuitive, then there would not have been a need to invent it in the first place.