the multiverse in a nutshell

8/13/2019 The Multiverse in a Nutshell

1/37

The multiverse

in a nutshell

STEVE ASH


2/37

The Multiverse in a Nutshell

Steve Ash is a professional writer, freelance tutor and lecturer in further education, he

graduated as a mature student in 2001 with a BA honours degree in Philosophy from

Kings College London, and obtained his !c in the Philosophy and "istory of !cience

from the L!# in 200$% "e has maintained a life long interest in Philosophy and Alternati&e

'hought, as well as a lo&e of !cience (iction and speculati&e writing of all )inds, as well as

being an amateur writer in this field himself with a couple of published wor)s and many

more in preparation%


3/37

Preface

'his essay is a multi*le&el introduction to the sub+ect of the ulti&erse, and its basis in

contemporary Physics, from the perspecti&e of the Philosophy of !cience with a nod to

the influence of !cience (iction along the way-% 'he main body of the te.t is a brief and

relati&ely simple introduction to the topic and contains a concise description of the basic

ideas, along with some of their important philosophical conse/uences% 'hose re/uiring a

more technical e.position are referred to the many footnotes which e.pand on the ideas in

more precise scientific terms e.plained as simply a possible% 'hose see)ing an in depth or

ad&anced treatment of the sub+ect are referred to further reading material at the end of the

essay% 'he launch of this essay was lin)ed to a seminar gi&en at the Atomic Bar) !cience

(iction and (antasy (ilm Club e&ent in London on ecember th2012%

Introduction

'he earliest use of the term ulti&erse can be traced to illiam 3ames in 145, who used

to refer to the total potential of the Cosmos, or in other words e&ery possible configuration

of e.istence, a totality that is now sometimes also referred to as the 6mni&erse% !ince

then the term has de&eloped se&eral meanings in a &ariety of paradigms, from obtuse

Logic to 7ew Age ysticism, causing some confusion% 8n general the term refers to a

di&erse collection of self*contained orlds, in some conceptual relation to each other,

which may or may not interact% A concept not without logical problems% 8t has been applied

to realms of abstract Philosophy, in which all logically or mathematically Possible orlds

are said to necessarily e.ist 1-, and to more concrete perspecti&es from Contemporary

Physics and Cosmology% But it is the latter which 8 shall be e.ploring here from the

perspecti&e of the Philosophy of !cience% 'hough in practice it is sometimes difficult to

separate the two as we shall disco&er%

8n tal)ing about the ulti&erse as it is understood in odern Physics we are really tal)ing

about two different things, the first relates to the 9elati&e !tate or any orlds

8nterpretation of :uantum Physics, as promoted by "ugh #&erett, Bryce eitt and most

recently a&id eutsch; and the second relates to Cosmology and the structure of our

con&entional !pace*time, in the light of 8nflation and *'heory% 8 shall treat theseseparately% 'hough there are also more recent attempts to combine them%


4/37

The Birth of the Multiverse

!cience (iction has produced many stories of Parallel s stories in the late ?0s .7one of these were

really supported by science howe&er, as no (ifth imension was seriously postulated at

this time other than &ia the mathematical abstractions of C " "inton in the 1440s-% 8t was

not until 1$4 when 3ac) illiamson wrote his Legions of Time stories that :uantum

echanics was employed as an e.planation for such Parallel orlds% 'hese tales

e.ploited the idea of :uantum >&irtual reality> the obser&ation that >ghostly> particles canappear and disappear randomly, e.isting for fractions of a second as >unreal> &irtual

particles, in some e.periments and interact with real particles, as well as each other, and

the related idea that the short alternati&e paths of a single particle could be treated as

e/ually real in such a &irtual sense- and described parallel >ghost worlds>, whose time

tra&elling inhabitants fought each other to ma)e their world the actual concrete reality@

Later in 1?1 9obert "einlein was influenced in a more serious way by &arious ideas in

both =eneral 9elati&ity and :uantum 'heory to propose in his story lsewhen,in whichParallel


5/37

The !uantum Multiverse

The "elative State Multiverse # The Man$ %orlds Inter&retation of !uantum Ph$sics '()*+

8t was an attempted interpretation of the biarre conse/uences of :uantum echanics 2-

that first led the Philosopher of !cience and Physicist, a. 3ammer, to apply the term

>ulti&erse> in odern Physics% "e deployed this in a 1? article to describe the any

orlds odel of "ugh #&erett and Bryce eitt% 'he term caught on and has been used

e&er since though today some prefer the word 6mni&erse to distinguish it from other

ulti&erse theories-% 'he any orlds model was de&ised in the late 50s by Physicist and

athematician "ugh #&erett for his Ph%% thesis under Prof 3ohn heeler, though hemore accurately called it 9elati&e !tate :uantum echanics% #&erett was wor)ing for the

Pentagon at the time on top secret 7uclear deployment pro+ects and only briefly engaged

with the world of 'heoretical Physics% "is super&isor heeler is more famous today for his

de&elopment of the idea of Blac) "oles and ormholes, and particularly his 6bser&er

Created 8t from Bit>- 2b-% But #&erett too) an opposing &iew to

this arguing, for a strict Physical 9ealism in which Consciousness had no role whatsoe&er%!imilarly frustrated by 7iels Bohr>s Copenhagen 8nterpretation of : nothing can be said

of an ob+ect between obser&ations- $- #&erett sought a more concrete alternati&e% 'oday

there are lots of alternati&es to the Copenhagen 8nterpretation e&en ma&eric) denials of

: itself-, but in the conte.t of the ulti&erse 8>m only going to focus on the 9elati&e !tate

odel #&erett de&ised as his response to both Bohr and heeler%

#&erett re+ected the Participatory Anthropic Principle in Physics, maintaining the strict

9ealist &iew, that 9eality and Consciousness were totally separate and could ne&er

interact, something he saw as fundamental to any rational empirical !cience% "e also

re+ected the slightly different idea that nothing was real until it was measured by an

obser&er, as seemed to be implied by the Copenhagen 8nterpretation% #&erett>s solution

was to declare all tal) of the collapse of the a&e (unction to be nonsensical as it was in

fact a mathematical description of reality, the same as any scientific formulation, and not a

probability function at all% 'hat is all the possible states after a measurement, described in

the function, were e/ually real and concrete, but e.isted in other


6/37

obser&er in any local probability description>% hen a

measurement was made the obser&er had caused a split in the s and declare that

Consciousness caused the split, and thus bringing in all sorts of psychic and magical

aspects to gates between worlds% #arlier in 1$? the =othic imagination of " P Lo&ecraft

the computer>, as the terrible, amoral og*!othoth, a daemonic being who opened and closed

passages between other orlds, creati&ely or destructi&ely% 'his was a magical ulti&erse

that was also manipulatable by alien technology, for the first time blurring science and

magic, aliens and gods, planets and hea&ens% 'his initiated another aspect of !cience

(iction and (antasy writing in the same niche that do&etailed nicely with ulti&erse stories%

But all this was imaginati&e speculation not bac)ed by any e&idence% uch of it was

nonsense, but some of the more thoughtful possibilities would inspire later physicists who

read !cience (iction%

hat #&erett was really doing here was creating a 'heory of 9elati&ity for :uantum

echanics, +ust as #instein had for 7ewtonian echanics, in which obser&ers do not

necessarily occupy the same absolute !pace*time framewor), but rather e.ist in a relati&e

one based on their own situated perspecti&e% 8n deploying #&erett>s thesis we can thus tal)

about the whole


7/37

physical process, rather than outside it as god*li)e a&e (unction collapsers% 'his would

ma)e the idea increasingly popular with materialist physicists annoyed by the fantastical

misapplication of :uantum Physics, a process continued later by the emerging 7ew Age

mo&ement% But the Philosophical /uestion here is does it ma)e senseD ost physicists at

first thought not, but faced with the e&en more biarre conse/uences of other attemptedinterpretations ha&e increasingly accepted it as the most rational solution% But then most

physicists are not grounded in a deeper tradition of philosophical thought%

#&erett became absorbed in his secret wor) for the Pentagon and died in 141 of a heart

attac) ironically after years of claiming cholesterol was only dangerous according to bad

science- But another Physicist, Bryce eitt, initially a sceptic of the 9elati&e !tate

hypothesis, came to accept it and too) it on as his own, renaming it the any*orldshypothesis in 1E4 a time enthusiastic for the weird and alternati&e-% ewitt was also a

better spin doctor than #&erett, and after writing a technical scientific boo) on the

hypothesis in 1$, which hardly anyone read, from 1E onwards began writing about it

in the >true science> pages of !cience (iction +ournals li)e Analog% 'his in turn inspired

!cience (iction writers who were already interested in the topic and probably had an

increasing influence on rising young physicists% A curious dialectic between science fiction

and science fact%

any people were unhappy with the 9elati&e !tate ulti&erse as it claimed all interactions

between branching realities was impossible as !uperspace was impassable and

wormholes only applied to normal !pace*time a contentious &iew today-% 8t was pointed

out that &irtual >ghost> particles, the multiple states of ob+ects in superposition, did in fact

interact under certain conditions, so in the any*orlds model interaction must be

possible% 'his led to some suggesting that !uperspace was really +ust another dimension

of ordinary !pace*time, a fifth dimension, much li)e the other spatial dimensions, left Fright,

upFdown, forwardFbac), or the temporal dimension of pastFfuture, e.cept this dimension

was not easily tra&ersable by person, particle or energy% Potential e&ents simply spread

out into it and thus became dis+unct in separate realities e&ery time a choice was made%

'hough under certain conditions interaction across this dimension was possible as the

barrier became permeable% An e.tra attraction to this &iew was that (ree ill suddenly

reentered deterministic science% 'his did not pro&e popular though due to the uncertainty

on what this dimension actually was and its inability to be described mathematically in

e.isting descriptions of !pace*time% But again !cience (iction too) up the idea, often


8/37

representing mo&ement into another hidden dimension as li)e passing through a barrier in

a familiar dimension, li)e a wall, or more metaphorically a mirror, into somewhere else%

#&en less popular was another suggestion that it wasn>t the s ind% 'hat is we

become aware of a different part of the ulti&erse when we ma)e an obser&ation% 6ralternati&ely we tune in our consciousness to different aspects of the ulti&erse and thus

e.perience them as our reality% ost physicists re+ected this idea as non*physical mumbo

+umbo% But an idea not too different would soon catch on%

Physicist and Philosopher a&id eutsch of 6.ford


9/37

transferring minds between people or into machines-% !o in Parallel orlds where our

doppelgGngers are identical, but some different situation e.ists on ars say, we are the

same person% A )ind of multiple personality in different bodies, or rather the same

personality in different bodies% And if so how different does our doppelgGnger ha&e to be to

become another person rather than a different &ersion of usD !cience (iction has a fieldday with ideas li)e this@

An e&en bigger problem, and one that will return later, is the problem of 8nfinity% 'here is no

logical reason to assume that there are an infinite number of alternati&e worlds, but there

maybe, and e&en if there isn>t the number of them will be so &ast and indefinite as to ha&e

the same problem as an infinite number of worlds% 'he most common is that somewhere,

in another as increasingly used by some theories- %

(or these reasons 8 re+ect the any*orlds model% ost physicists also re+ect the idea of a

physical infinity, regarding it as an imaginary product or component of abstract

mathematics, and so introduce a process called 7ormalisation, a fiddle factor to remo&e

infinities were they occur in mathematical descriptions and predictions% !ome Platonic pro

8nfinity physicists re+ect 7ormalisation as a biased inter&ention in >true maths>, howe&er it


10/37

has led to many inno&ations such as !upersymmetry and !tring 'heory%

8 thin) #&erett did ha&e some good point howe&er, but 8 don>t thin) we ha&e to postulate

multiple physical parallel worlds as corresponding to alternati&e states coded in the a&e

(unction, or e&en &irtual ghost worlds% e can +ust as easily say the a&e (unctiondescribes a deeper hypostatic uni&erse of pure potential, in which all possible states e.ist

in a para*consistent potentia at the same time% An underlying primal Kaos in which our


11/37

It -ame rom Another /imension.

Another )ind of ulti&erse is fre/uently deployed in !cience (iction% 6ne in which the

protagonists sometimes tra&el into another another imension> a dimension is +ust an e.tensi&e magnitude or a direction, though

could be the direction into a world based on another set of dimensions-% !uch a world is

typically alien to ours, rather than +ust an alternati&e &ersion of it% 6r con&ersely a being

from such a world enters our world% !uch an idea was once the pro&ince of fol)lore, with

its land of faerie, and of religion with its hea&en and hells% 'he first secular &ersion of it

was perhaps written in 1EEE by the poetess and philosopher argaret Ca&endish, the

uchess of 7ewcastle, whose no&el TheBla0ing %orlddescribed a traditional (aerie land

with scientific plausibility, reached &ia magnetic gates at the 7orth Pole and inhabited by

man*animal hybrids of all )inds, as well as fol)lore entities the idea was adopted by Alan

oore in his League of Gentlemanseries-% 'he concept of such a world e&ol&ed with

scientific )nowledge in later fiction% 'ypically this world might also ha&e different laws of

nature, or different geometries, or perhaps a greater or lesser number of dimensions than

ours and if greater be inhabited by superior beings with a greater e.perience and

)nowledge of reality, or perhaps creatures totally alien to us and our laws of nature-% 8deas

e.ploited to their full e.tent by " P Lo&ecraft, most o&ertly in his rom Be$ond 120-, butsubtly in many more of his wor)s% Alternati&ely such uni&erses might actually be similar to

our own and perhaps e&en identical another form of Alternati&e factitious>

filmTheMothman Pro&hecieswas adapted from, belie&ed this to be the case and the real

scientific e.planation for many supernatural and mysterious occurrences% !uch ideas are

re+ected by mainstream science, but how many of these ideas could be scientifically trueD

%


12/37

The -osmological Multiverse 'Alan Guth, earl$ 1234s and &rior+

8f we can dismiss the possibility of a physical 6mni&erse, and replace it with a :uantum

Potential t dismiss the 6mni&erse we still ha&e to face this, because the two

aren>t mutually e.clusi&e, though together certainly comple.ify the problem@

'o understand the nature of the Cosmological ulti&erse we ha&e to start at the beginning

of the


13/37

manifest as the =ra&itational (ield or cur&ature of the Bubble and the Hacuum energy that

emerges in the empty Bubble% e might e.pect these Bubbles to be also transient, and

many are, but if the =ra&itational energy which is negati&e in nature e.actly balances the

Hacuum energy which is positi&e the two will cancel out and the sum of the Bubbles

energy will be ero ?-% hich in principle means it can e.ist for e&er@ !uch a Bubble couldcontain the total positi&e energy of the )nown t e.pose you to more technicalities on this as you don>t really need to )now this E-

'he )ey point is this 8nflation e.plains why the


14/37

But what does all this ha&e to do with the ulti&erseD 'he fact is there is no logical reason

why this Bubble should be the only one formed, and therefore the only


15/37

8nflationary ulti&erses are prone to a &ery serious problem howe&er% Cosmic 8nflation

needs &ery precise initial conditions of a low &acuum energy, and a perfect 8nflaton (ield

that must not be too strong or too wea)% 'hese are &ery rare conditions and as has been

pointed out tend to undermine the benefit the theory has for the =oldiloc)s #nigma% =i&en

the re/uired initial low energy state to pre&ent too many bubbles forming and banging into each other- its seems unli)ely enough bubbles formed at beginning of the


16/37

tuning thesis% 8n fact #ternal 8nflation ma)es both the Cosmic 8nflating


17/37

and many others since, as a )ind of inter*dimensional short*cut and alternati&e to a

wormhole for long distance space tra&el% 'hus would imply an e.tra dimension or

dimensions and our !pace*time would thus be contained in a larger


18/37

hypothetical !uperspace and the two lots of Alternati&e


19/37

M5Theor$ 'dward %itten, mid 24s+

*'heory is seen by many as the "oly =rail of Physics, one of the only two theories li)ely

to combine :uantum 'heory and =eneral 9elati&ity 'heory, the only other realistic solution

being !uantum Loo& Gravit$some Physicists wor) on radical alternati&es but so far this

has been unproducti&e, and neither : or =9' ha&e failed in a prediction in almost one

hundred years-% But as the former wor)s down from 9elati&ity 'heory to a modified

:uantum 'heory and the latter wor)s up from :uantum 'heory to a modified 9elati&ity

'heory they are e.pected to con&erge at some mutually transforming point% *'heory is

thus &ery popular at the moment though nowhere near as theoretically well de&eloped as

8nflation, nor e.perimentally &erified in any way, or e&en bac)ed by e&idence% But it still

remains a mathematically sound and powerfully e.planatory description, though an

incomplete one and only be a possible future alternati&e%

eri&ati&e of !tring 'heory the idea that all particles are &ibrations produced by tiny one

dimensional strings 10-- *'heory describes the


20/37

howe&er this may +ust mean it is incredibly small%

8n terms of Cosmology there are roughly three different models that use *'heory%

6ne is a &ersion of 8nflation theory in which 8nflation is dri&en by the energy released into

the Bul) by the collision of two high dimensional Branes, one of matter the other of anti*matter% 'hese will release energy in pulses as each dimension is annihilated, though

:uantum fluctuations can stop the brea)down at any point% 'he energy will be absorbed

by low dimensional *Branes which inflate% "igh dimensional Branes occupy more space

and ha&e a higher chance of colliding in this way, which is unli)ely for low dimensional *

Branes% 'his has the effect of an initially small number of closely pac)ed large uni&erses

becoming a large number of relati&ely spaced out small uni&erses% 'he problem here is

how these uni&erses come about% !ome thin) /uantum fluctuations in the Branes maycause them to split in two and replicate li)e amoebas, but this still need a primary comple.

Brane to start% 'his led to the idea of the Cyclic Brane theory% "ere a pair of Branes are

lin)ed together by a spring li)e energy field, related to ar) #nergy but a )ind that

contracts the Bul) rather than 8nflates !pace*time-% 'his causes the Branes to bang into

each other li)e a pair of cymbals, then bounce bac) o&er periods on trillions of years% An

earlier non*cyclic &ersion thought this would create 8nflation in the Branes but this was

pro&ed false 11-% 8t is now thought that the


21/37

to seed new Branes or +ust different regions of a single Brane, or some combination of the

two% espite the growing popularity of this theory it still has no e&idence in support of

howe&er and may be utterly false though e.periments are under way to find traces of

polarised bac)ground radiation belie&ed associated with colliding Branes-%

'he interesting conse/uence of this theory is that not only alternati&e


22/37

Startling Alternatives

6ne curious element of the ulti&erse theory is what are the alternati&es if it fails, that is if

neither 8nflation and *'heory wor)D Because then there are &ery interesting

conse/uences% 'his is unli)ely 8 thin), but certainly possible% 6f course if there is only one

non*cyclic


23/37

and these might e&entually undermine the whole !imulation% Another tell tale sign,

according to 3ohn =ribbin, would be if we measured Pi &ery accurately at some point in

the future and found it ended a real measurement should produce an infinite &alue of Pi

he thin)s, while a !imulation would ha&e to appro.imate it-% (urther more why would

anyone bother to !imulate a


24/37

-onclusions

e ha&e e.plored many different )inds of Physical ulti&erse in this essay, :uantum

Alternati&e 9ealities, istant Bubble


25/37

7otes

1- 8n pure philosophy, drawing on the belief that the >real is the rational>, the ulti&erse

can signify the idea that all logically possible worlds, or situations, actually e.ists

somewhere, e&en though not necessarily e.isting as the world we e.perience% An idea

formalised in Logic as odal 9ealism% An idea that can be e.tended to include all types of

alternati&e Logic% A position ta)en to its e.treme by the logician Lewis Carroll in his Alice

boo)s% A similar idea is )nown in athematics as the Platonic belief that e&ery

mathematically consistent description of e.istence, of which there can be many in mutual

contradiction, is e/ually real and describes some separate domain of a multiple reality% But

all this re/uires a strong faith in 9eason as the foundation of 9eality, a position that can

lead to all sorts of mind boggling parado.es% 8n complete opposition to this the ulti&erseor 6mni&erse can be said to include the un)nown, or e&en the un)nowable or irrational,

something sometimes referred to as the Ieno&erse% But this doesn>t e.actly help us

understand what it is% A far more manageable tas) is simply to rely on our senses and an

empirical study of possibility and reach a scientific understanding of the ulti&erse% But

this in itself leads us along many paths, most of which can not be constrained to the purely

empirical%

2- :uantum echanics arose from obser&ational measurement under e.perimental

conditions of subatomic phenomena at the beginning of the 20 thcentury% 8t threw Classical

Physics into chaos after a number of biarre phenomena were obser&ed% Particles could

appear and disappear randomly, ta)e different random paths simultaneously, could

sometimes beha&e li)e wa&es and sometimes li)e particles, as also could all wa&e

phenomena, and crucially could not ha&e their position )nown with certainty if their

momentum was measured, or their position if their momentum was measured, and

similarly for &arious other pair of factors, such as time and energy where duration and

energy could not be simultaneously measured-% 'his fact was formalised as "eisenberg>s


26/37

particle with different possible positions due its random path between A and B for instance

could interact with itself as if all the possibilities were actually there as >&irtual particles> as

demonstrated in the famous double slit 8nterference e.periment-@ At least this was the case

between measurements, for as soon as one was made e&erything was seen to be

classical and normal% 'his was demonstrated by the logical history of a particle as itpassed through the &arious conditions in its path or paths- between measurements for

e.ample a particle faced with two possible routes through or around an obstacle could

randomly ta)e either, but would be seen in the route where a measuring de&ice was

placed, and with no measuring de&ice &irtual particles in both paths seem to interact and

modify each other e&en when only one particle was present@-% Position is the easiest

property to imagine in this conte.t but it applies to all properties in sometimes mind

boggling ways% 8t seemed chaos reigned when no one was loo)ing and when they didsome order was restored% #&en stranger all this was shown to be non*local, meaning if

paired properties were un)nown positi&e and negati&e polarities, up and down spin of a

particle, or any mutually related pair- when one of the pair was measured the other

component instantly became that one>s classical opposite, e&en if they had been

separated by many light years of space or by time itself, and the result depends on how

you choose to measure it@-% 8f no other change is made to the condition of a property and it

is no longer obser&ed it will return to its uncertain state again% 8f a change is made to it by

some outside influence it adopt it new state permanently% 7o one can really understand

what is going on here, the physicist 9ichard (eynman is often /uoted as saying >if you

thin) you understand :uantum echanics you don>t@> But mathematical descriptions of

what may happen ha&e been selected by e.periment and trial and error, and found to be

100J accurate, but no one )nows why or what they actually represent% 'he most

important are the a&e (unction, a description of e&ery possible state or property of a

physical ob+ect or system, which wor)s best as a mathematical description formerly

de&ised to describe physical wa&es other forms are more li)e tables called atrices-, and

a description of the easurement 6peration, in which the rele&ant pairs of properties

such as position and momentum- described in the a&e (unction are lin)ed together as if

they were parts of a rigid ob+ect, using a formula pre&iously used to map geometry% 'he

actual results obtained will be random but some are more li)ely than others in terms of

their odds it is more li)ely the photon from a pro+ector to a screen will tra&el in a straight

line and less li)ely it will tra&el &ia the oon but both are possible and described in

different part of the a&e (unction-% ost physicists +ust accept the formuli ha&e statistical

predicti&e powers and don>t as) why% 6thers attempt to e.plain it% =enerally the a&e


27/37

(unction is regarded as a mathematical structure based on probable states represented as

graph*li)e cur&e, others thin) it is a real wa&e of some )ind% An e.ample used by science

writer 3ohn =ribbin is an unobser&ed electron in a closed bo.% 8t appears to &irtually >e.ist>

in e&ery possible location in the bo. at the same time as described by a a&e (unction

until the bo. is opened when it will appear in a random position influenced only bystatistical laws in this case e&en odds anywhere-% hen the lid is replaced it will e.ist in

all possible positions again, but statistically related to the last place it was seen in% #&en if

a physical barrier is put in the bo. and it is seen on one side of it when opened it may

appear on the other side of the barrier when closed and opened again with lower odds of

it appearing on the same side-% 'he only e.ception is if the bo. is di&ided as it is obser&ed

a change by an outside influence- then closed and the two hal&es mo&ed apart% 'hen the

electron must appear in that separate half it was obser&ed in but >e.ists> in all possiblepositions in that half@

!uch :uantum eirdness was formerly combined to the microscopic world by statistical

limits% 8t only applied to subatomic particles and so as a macroscopic system

is composed of billions of particles a few may beha&e weirdly perhaps affecting a finely

balanced comple. system- but most will beha&e >normally>, thus in general on a large scale

e&erything is classical% 'his is still belie&ed by some physicists but recent e.periments are

showing >:uantum eirdness> affects larger and large ob+ects, and most recently a tiny,

barely &isible crystal has been put into superposition and demonstrated to be in multiple

contradictory states% 8n principle all ob+ects and systems of any scale can be put into

superposition, e&en the


28/37

8inar$ choices, 8its. (It from 8it( s$m8oli0es the idea that ever$ item of the &h$sical world

has at 8ottom9a ver$ dee& 8ottom, in most instances9an immaterial source and

e6&lanation; that which we call realit$ arises in the last anal$sis from the &osing of $esup> instead of not spin >up>, or is at

point IM or not point IM it can be &iewed as containing, or e&en being, a switch with a 1

or 0 &alue, in which the obser&er is an agent in deciding the &alue% All the switches

together comprise an >intelligent computer> which is basically the ind of the "olodec)> or >atri.>%

%

$- 'echnically Bohr>s Copenhagen 8nterpretation of : 12- is non*committal% 8t

describes the a&e (unction as a Probability a&e that is an abstract predicti&e tool and

not a physical wa&e, but it is ambi&alent on whether the Probability concerned it !ub+ecti&e

Probability the probability of a belief about an actual state being true- or 6b+ecti&e

Probability the probability of some potential state of affairs actually becoming true-% !o our

uncertainty might be one of our )nowledge of where the particle actually is, or an intrinsic

uncertainty in the actual position of the particle% Physicists adopting a Copenhagen

approach are still di&ided on this distinction or don>t thin) it matters-% 8n practice Bohr

himself, and most of his followers, fa&oured the latter on their e.perience of e.perimental

data primarily the double slit e.periment of 10, where single particles beha&ed li)e

particles when measured as such but as wa&es when not-% 'hey claimed an unobser&ed

particle e.isted e&erywhere and so nowhere- at the same time, until we made a

measurement, and to tal) of its state outside of a measurement act was meaningless

Bohr had been a logical positi&ist, regarding all non*scientific statements as

meaningless-% 'his was because they insisted it didn>t e.ist in any con&entional sense

outside of the moment of measurement or the moment of interaction-, but rather had

some >ghost*li)e> status in all its possible states, enabling the rare self interaction of those

possible states% 8t was as if reality was not composed of ob+ects in relation to each other

but rather of relations that generated ob+ects% 8n practice science only described the

measured states and created a >fictional history> from +oining those measured states

together% (or all intents and purposes this >fictional history> was true, as it had an actual


29/37

effect in the orld% But tal)ing metaphysically about what actually e.isted beyond our

interaction with it, or tal)ing about the who is

obser&ing the obser&erD> when they commit the apparently classical act of measuring a

:uantum !uperposition, and thus >collapsing a a&e (unction>, and >who is obser&ing the

A perspecti&e re/uired by Cosmologists wor)ing with 9elati&ity

'heory, which Bohr had re+ected as nonsense, declaring the only thing scientists can tal)

about is the result of an e.periment in the lab and specific local phenomena as measured%

$c- ecoherence 'heory in particular relies on the idea of Consistent "istories% 'his is

here ta)e to mean that a easurement is not an 6bser&ation it is a Causal connection and

that a system of causal connections must ha&e a logically consistent structure% !o when a

measurement is made of some isolate atomic process it becomes connected through the

apparatus to the wider uni&erse of the obser&er and must conform with it for as long as it

remains connected% 'he


30/37

#&en indi&iduation itself could be a concept within an unidi&iduated consciousness%

$d- :uantum 'heory postulates that all matter is particulate ultimately to :uar)s and

#lectrons and their mutations- as is all energy ultimately to Photons and other Bosons-

but at the same time part of a continuum a field of energy-% 'his can also be e.tended to!pace*time itself &ia the :uantiation of =ra&ity into =ra&itons which interact with >/uanta

of !pace*time>% !uch /uanta do not flit around li)e other particles, they presumably ha&e

nothing to flit about in contentiously- but rather form a seething chaotic mass which 3ohn

heeler called :uantum (oam% ithin this region Hirtual /uanta of !pace*time rub

shoulders with more concrete /uanta, whate&er that means at this le&el% 'he energy that

allows this is supposedly ta)en from the potential energy of the =ra&ity (ield, said to be

infinite% 'he e.act mechanism has yet to be disco&ered perhaps &irtual =ra&itons poppingout of 8nfinity briefly become >atricons> and >Chronons>D Perhaps the ultimate :uantum

Potentia is the causeD 7o one yet )nows%

?- (or #.ample 'wo positi&ely charged bodies in interaction re/uire an energy input to

push them together and the repulsi&e positi&e electric field grows stronger in this process

by the same factor, while an interaction between positi&ely and negati&ely charged bodies

produces the )inetic energy of their attraction, and each field becomes stronger in this

process creating an acceleration, but the sum of the fields, the total field, becomes wea)er,

because the rising positi&e and negati&e fields will be cancelling each other out towards a

ero charge by the same amount as the energy created% 8n contrast two massi&e bodies in

interaction produce the )inetic energy of their attraction and each field will similarly get

stronger, but so will the sum of both fields because there>s no polarity% 'herefore the

=ra&ity (ield is negati&e and the #lectric (ield positi&e in their total energy%

5- 8n more detail the process is based on an understanding of the


31/37

remains ero energy% A trade off of energy and time% 'his is also true for !pace*time itself

which in :uantum 'heory at the smallest scale is thought to be a chaotic sea of /uanta in

superposition, that combine at a larger scale into the fabric of !pace*time% 'herefore

/uanta of !pace*time can spontaneously manifest as a random bubble of !pace*time from

this superpositional chaotic foam at any time% 'his empty !pace*time bubble will alsoconsist of energy both in the form of its cur&ature, or gra&itational field, and the potential

energy inherent in the Hacuum created% 8t thus might also be only e.pected to e.ist in this

energised state for only an instant before &anishing% But something strange happens%

Because =ra&itational energy is negati&e and other forms of energy are positi&e the two

cancel each other out lea&ing a ero energy state 2-% !o that we could get the

spontaneous permanent generation from 7othing of a super dense empty Bubble of

!pace*time, with a massi&e =ra&itational field, that manifests as much Hacuum energy asis present in our entire


32/37

near empty-% ore precisely it does so from the inside out creating a gradient !calar (ield%

'he precise mechanism howe&er remains un)nown% 8n contrast Chaotic 8nflation 'heory

regards the same Hacuum process as a spontaneous :uantum fluctuation in the Hacuum

state that occurs spontaneously under un)nown conditions and is probably random% 'his

means it can happen in any Hacuum anywhere at any time not +ust at the beginning of theeat /eathoccurs when the


33/37

un)nown%

4- Prof artin 9ees formulates the fine*tuning of the


34/37

new


35/37

fre/uencies-% et despite it simplicity !tring 'heory was found to ha&e many possible

formulations, e&entually reducible to fi&e, but no less% itten mathematically pro&ed that

these were all different perspecti&es on possible situations in *'heory%

11- 'he process of Brane collision did not create enough energy for 8nflation% Anotheralternati&e regarded the uniform nature of the


36/37

urther "eading

Books

8n !earch of the ulti&erse, 3ohn =ribbin a &ery accessible introduction to the H theory-

8n !earch of !chrRdingerSs Cat, 3ohn =ribbin a &ery accessible introduction to :-

'he


37/37

the multiverse in a nutshell

Documents