You may ask "Which Universe Am I In?"

[Sherlock Holmes]

I'm up to my ears in youtube videos. Here is an example of the Mandelbrot set in a nine dimensional space:

That looks stunning, I don't understand the mathematical basis of it, but visually it is remarkable. The use of music too is fascinating, somehow lends a depth to it that silence does not, this is another computed video that does that, mesmerizing:

 

[scruffy]

I have also wondered about the big ado on entanglement not being local. The photon does not experience space or time. Think of the Fitzgerald contraction seeing objects becoming thinner and thinner as you approach light speed. Space will shrink to zero at the speed of light, and the photon will be absorbed the instant it is created in it's own time frame.

That is well known physics. So entanglement over large distances is always local to the photon. But I have not seen that observation anywhere. It should give solace to those who think entanglement is "spooky."

Still doesn't explain the collapse due to measurement.

 

[Sherlock Holmes]

I'm up to my ears in youtube videos. Here is an example of the Mandelbrot set in a nine dimensional space:

Did you write the code that draws this?

 

[Dante]

I was simply drawing the distinction between a formal testable theory and an elegant appealing but untestable model. If some model is not testable then that's relevant in science, that's all.

Right. And you could've said that, but you didn't.

Far too much pop-science is about models, interesting ideas and schemes and unfortunately this misleads the layman, misrepresents what a "proper" theory is, a true theory must survive brutal tests, rigor is essential.

Pop science is one thing. Calling string theory and multiverse theories pop science is ignorant and ridiculous. It is not the popular world that made the case for the theories. It is genuine physicists.

Nothing wrong with discussing ideas and speculating so long as we understand that actual theories in physics can be used to make concrete predictions and we can compare those with real observations, I'm astonished that this is even seen as controversial, in a forum dedicated to science this should not even need to be said.

String theory is far beyond my mathematical skills, I first read about it in the late 70s as I was winding up my own studies of general relativity, I was impressed by the ideas, they do provide a mathematical framework that seems to encompass much of the world but require more spatial dimensions that we observe.

The reason Penrose and others take the view they do, is that the model does not predict anything new, anything more than the other theories we have predict. So spacetime might have more than four dimensions and be built from "strings" or there might be a completely different model too, because string theory does not predict anything new we cannot test it and so we will never know.

Penrose explains what he thinks and other explain what they think. Dueling banjos.

We can't say "If string theory is correct, then we should expect to see XXX when we do YYY" but we can't say that, we have no way of finding out - that's the basis of Penrose's position (and many others). Everything we can predict with string theory we can already predict with other theories.

After general relativity was formalized and completed, there were lots of efforts by Einstein and other theoreticians to expand it to cover stuff not covered in GR, lots of these models were created but they were testable and so could be rejected, you likely know of Einstein's efforts to devise a unified field theory.

 

[BackAgain]

I’d ask the dainty if he can explain (in layman’s terms) what string theory is?

Let us imagine the moments prior to the Big Bang. There was no energy. There was no matter. There was no space. There was no time.

From that absolute void something sprang.

How? How does any present day advanced quantum physics explain how and why that came to pass?

I understand that they have “an” answer of sorts. But their answer is itself utterly untestable. Thus, it is unscientific in the precise sense that science demands that a theory be falsifiable.

Since it can’t be falsified, it is no better a theory of creation than an appeal to the supernatural. In fact, since science cannot explain it, and the closest it gets requires us to suspend the laws of physics and nature (as we grasp those laws), the quantum physics theory is an appeal to the supernatural itself.

If science says that nothing can exist prior to itself yet science also says that due to quantum probability absolute nothing can spontaneously generate not just “something” but everything, the explanation itself demands a belief in the supernatural.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

How? How does any present day advanced quantum physics explain how and why that came to pass?

Yep!

A good layman's book is "A Universe From Nothing".

As far as explaining how the big bang arose from a dense state of energy and matter, that explanation has been on the books for a while.

 

[BackAgain]

Yep!

A good layman's book is "A Universe From Nothing".

As far as explaining how the big bang arose from a dense state of energy and matter, that explanation has been on the books for a while.

Nope. Where did that dense state of matter/energy come from?

In order for it to exist at all, it had to come from somewhere or something.

 

[Dante]

How can it be falsified then?

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Where did that dense state of matter/energy come from?

We don't know. But we have more than one plausible explanation.

I even pointed you to one such book.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

In order for it to exist at all, it had to come from somewhere or something.

False. That's what i am trying to tell you.

 

[Wuwei]

Did you write the code that draws this?

Yes. 4 years ago, but I'm still refining it. It is written in Java.

 

[BackAgain]

We don't know. But we have more than one plausible explanation.

“Plausible?” Not really. More akin to “possible” explanation.

I even pointed you to one such book.

Yeah. I haven’t read it.

 

[BackAgain]

False. That's what i am trying to tell you.

Well then how did it get to be here?

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

“Plausible?” Not really. More akin to “possible” explanation.

And yet still, to say that no explanation exists is not true. More than one exists. That includes magical nonsense.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Well then how did it get to be here?

I have no idea! Do you?

 

[Wuwei]

Nope. Where did that dense state of matter/energy come from?

In order for it to exist at all, it had to come from somewhere or something.

Lawrence Krauss also has a video on YouTube with the same title, "A Universe From Nothing" he is a very entertaining speaker.

 

[scruffy]

Penrose explains what he thinks and other explain what they think. Dueling banjos.

Penrose has already been proven wrong about the brain.

Many smart people have been proven wrong about the brain. Francis Crick is another one.

Penrose jumped the gun, he spoke too soon.

Why, just last month they discovered that mitochondria inject their DNA into the nucleus of cells in the brain. Not blood cells, not muscles, just brain cells. Why do you think that is?

 

[BackAgain]

And yet still, to say that no explanation exists is not true. More than one exists. That includes magical nonsense.

I give you an item of alleged value. You ask, “how do I know what this thing is worth?” I tell you it is “probably” worth a million dollars. You say, “if it’s ‘probable’ then maybe it’s worth a lot less.” I say,” it’s possibly worth a million.” You say, “so now there are a lot of reasons to doubt it’s worth!”

True. But it doesn’t establish its actual value OR the lack of it.

~~~~

Discounting all the theories by the “qualifications” means that there are lots of worthless explanations. Ok. I haven’t disputed that. The important thing is to EVALUATE any theory by logic. That way you can reject incorrect theories.

That’s been going on for a long time. And it really boils down to a belief (one way or the other) in the supernatural.

Supernatural isn’t used as it is frequently used in an off handed way. Supernatural doesn’t really mean “magic.” It only means something over and above science.

God is clearly supernatural given that definition.

But so is our (limited) understanding of science. We have some scientific explanations for how our universe came to be. But we have none which don’t require that we assume a state of affairs which themselves are incomplete.

If an explanation/theory has to originally select preconditions which contradict what we have previously assumed were the laws of science, then that theory requires that we accept that which is above or beyond science.

It comes down to a necessary belief in the supernatural, one way or the other,

 

[Dante]

Penrose has already been proven wrong about the brain.

Many smart people have been proven wrong about the brain. Francis Crick is another one.

Penrose jumped the gun, he spoke too soon.

Why, just last month they discovered that mitochondria inject their DNA into the nucleus of cells in the brain. Not blood cells, not muscles, just brain cells. Why do you think that is?

They don't mind being proven wrong.

 

[scruffy]

They don't mind being proven wrong.

True. They're good scientists. Penrose's tiling theory was brilliant. So was Crick's searchlight hypothesis, at the time. Something like that does happen, and these smartie types pick up on it intuitively. But brains are mysterious, they don't give up their secrets easily.

Anyway sorry, didn't mean to derail your thread. Multiverse smacks of Schrodinger's Cat, the thing which is both dead and alive. I think there's a scope issue with that. It may apply at the quantum level but matter seems to be pretty stable for the most part.

I would tend in the opposite direction. Information at the Planck level. Discrete exchanges of information can explain a lot. Including things like "virtual photons".