Time travellers: David Tennant as Doctor Who
with Billie Piper as Rose
Posted on 09/22/2007 8:52:50 PM PDT by bruinbirdman
Science fiction looks closer to becoming science fact.
Parallel universes really do exist, according to a mathematical discovery by Oxford scientists that sweeps away one of the key objections to the mind boggling and controversial idea.
The work has wider implications since the idea of parallel universes sidesteps one of the key problems with time travel. Every since it was given serious lab cred in 1949 by the great logician Kurt Godel, many eminent physicists have argued against time travel because it undermines ideas of cause and effect to create paradoxes: a time traveller could go back to kill his grandfather so that he is never born in the first place.
Time travellers: David Tennant as Doctor Who
with Billie Piper as Rose
But the existence of parallel worlds offers a way around these troublesome paradoxes, according to David Deutsch of Oxford University, a highly respected proponent of quantum theory, the deeply mathematical, successful and baffling theory of the atomic world.
He argues that time travel shifts between different branches of reality, basing his claim on parallel universes, the so-called "many-worlds" formulation of quantum theory.
The new work bolsters his claim that quantum theory does not forbid time travel. "It does sidestep it. You go into another universe," he said yesterday, though he admits that there is still a way to go to find schemes to manipulate space and time in a way that makes time hops possible.
"Many sci fi authors suggested time travel paradoxes would be solved by parallel universes but in my work, that conclusion is deduced from quantum theory itself", Dr Deutsch said, referring to his work on many worlds.
The mathematical idea of parallel worlds was first glimpsed by the great quantum pioneer, Erwin Schrodinger, but actually published in 1957 by Hugh Everett III, when wrestling with the problem of what actually happens when an observation is made of something of interest - such as an electron or an atom - with the intention of measuring its position or its speed.
In the traditional brand of quantum mechanics, a mathematical object called a wave function, which contains all possible outcomes of a measurement experiment, "collapses" to give a single real outcome.
Everett came up with a more audacious interpretation: the universe is constantly and infinitely splitting, so that no collapse takes place. Every possible outcome of an experimental measurement occurs, each one in a parallel universe.
If one accepts Everett's interpretation, our universe is embedded in an infinitely larger and more complex structure called the multiverse, which as a good approximation can be regarded as an ever-multiplying mass of parallel universes.
Every time there is an event at the quantum level - a radioactive atom decaying, for example, or a particle of light impinging on your retina - the universe is supposed to "split" into different universes.
A motorist who has a near miss, for instance, might feel relieved at his lucky escape. But in a parallel universe, another version of the same driver will have been killed. Yet another universe will see the motorist recover after treatment in hospital. The number of alternative scenarios is endless.
In this way, the "many worlds" interpretation of quantum mechanics allows a time traveller to alter the past without producing problems such as the notorious grandfather paradox.
But the "many worlds" idea has been attacked, with one theoretician joking that it is "cheap on assumptions but expensive on universes" and others that it is "repugnant to common sense."
Now new research confirms Prof Deutsch's ideas and suggests that Dr Everett, who was a Phd student at Princeton University when he came up with the theory, was on the right track.
Commenting in New Scientist magazine, Prof Andy Albrecht, a physicist at the University of California, Davis, said of the link between probability and many worlds: "This work will go down as one of the most important developments in the history of science."
Quantum mechanics describes the strange things that happen in the subatomic world - such as the way photons and electrons behave both as particles and waves. By one interpretation, nothing at the subatomic scale can really be said to exist until it is observed.
Until then, particles occupy nebulous "superposition" states, in which they can have simultaneous "up" and "down" spins, or appear to be in different places at the same time.
According to quantum mechanics, unobserved particles are described by "wave functions" representing a set of multiple "probable" states. When an observer makes a measurement, the particle then settles down into one of these multiple options.
But the many worlds idea offers an alternative view. Dr Deutsch showed mathematically that the bush-like branching structure created by the universe splitting into parallel versions of itself can explain the probabilistic nature of quantum outcomes. This work was attacked but it has now had rigorous confirmation by David Wallace and Simon Saunders, also at Oxford.
Dr Saunders, who presented the work with Wallace at the Many Worlds at 50 conference at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Canada, told New Scientist: "We've cleared up the obscurities and come up with a pretty clear verdict that Everett works. It's a dramatic turnaround and it means that people now have to discuss Everett seriously."
Dr Deutsch added that the work addresses a three-century-old problem with the idea of probability itself, described by one philosopher, Prof David Papineu, as a scandal. "We didn't really know what probability means," said Dr Deutsch.
There's a convention that it's rational to treat it for most purposes as if we knew it was going to happen even though we actually know it need not. But this does not capture the reality, not least the 0.1 per cent chance something will not happen.
"So," said Dr Deutsch, "the problems of probability, which were until recently considered the principal objection to the otherwise extremely elegant theory of Everett (which removes every element of mysticism and double-talk that have crept into quantum theory over the decades) have now turned into its principal selling point."
I proved that Grigory Perelman's proof of the century-old Poincare Conjecture was incorrect. I have not received my million rubles.
yitbos
In any case congratulations on about 10% decent replies, the rest being hackneyed political (non-)humor.
Yeah, that happens to me, too. I’ve noticed it is particularly accute near large, electrical appliances.
Numerous times I’ve sat, halfway between the refrigerator and the TV (country-style kitchen), and heard about so-and-so has just died. Then a month later I find out the bloke is still alive.
I think I should move the TV.
WAITER I’ll have 2 of whatever their Drinking please
So he can get some "writer cred", someone should inform this dude that the term is "Ever since", not "Every since".
In my parallel universe, 32 year old Buddy Holly survived a close call in 1959 when the Beechcraft Bonanza he was traveling in almost crashed after engine trouble, fortunately the pilot was able to bring the aircraft to a safe, if rough landing.
After that near brush with death, Holly retired from the music industry in 1960 and successfully ran for Congress in the 19th congressional district (Lubbock) and he became a strong advocate for the military, having once volunteered for military service in 1944 at the age of 17.
Following the assassination of JFK in 1963, newly inaugurated President Lyndon Johnson took note of the up and coming Holly, and asked the Democratic convention of ‘64 to nominate Holly as his Vice Presidential candidate, and following the LBJ landslide against Goldwater, Holly found himself the youngest Vice President in U.S. history.
LBJ sent his new Vice President on a fact finding mission to Vietnam in early 1966, and upon his return Holly was unintentionally caught on a live-TV feed saying “America can win this war as long as we don’t let the damn Commies in the U.N. do to us what they did to us in Korea in ‘53”, this resulted in public support for the Vietnam War increasing to the point where a ‘Victory Movement’ formed, with massive ‘Victory Now’ protests taking place in every major U.S. city, LBJ was reported to have said to Holly “you sure have a way with words Buddy, now I guess we’re going to have to bomb those gooks back into the Stone Age, like LeMay said we ought to do”.
After 90 days of strategic bombing of every industrial-military target in North Vietnam, Hanoi was informed by Secretary of State Dean Rusk that if they did not surrender unconditionally, that nuclear weapons would be employed and Red China was privately notified that if Hanoi did not surrender, that the coming American nuclear strike would also include Peking’s rudimentary military-industrial base.
Hanoi’s Communists surrendered, and Vietnam was unified under the government of President Nguyen Van Thieu. With the exception of Red China and their stooge regime in North Korea, Communism in the Far East was suddenly on the decline.
Following the unexpected and near fatal heart attack of LBJ in the summer of 1968 and his subsequent withdrawal from the campaign, Vice President Charles Hardin ‘Buddy’ Holly was nominated by acclamation by the Democratic convention as their presidential candidate, and in a surprising move, Holly asked retired Air Force General Curtis E. LeMay to be his running mate, and LeMay accepted.
The Holly-LeMay ticket went on to victory by a comfortable margin over the liberal Republican ticket led by New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller and Massachusetts Senator Edward Brooke.
After eight years of Democratic political domination, America became restless in 1976, and when former California Governor Ronald Reagan thundered ‘America, it’s time for a change!’ and pointed out the hypocrisy of an Administration that had it’s roots in urging victory in Vietnam, but settling for ‘detente’ with the Soviet Union. Reagan’s bold denunciation of the Soviets as an ‘Evil Empire’ resonated with the voters, and when Reagan, having sewn up the GOP nomination early, made it known that his only choice for Vice President was ‘Mr. Conservative himself’, i.e. Senator Barry Goldwater, conservatives in America went wild, and the Democratic ticket of one-term Governor of Georgia Jimmy Carter and Senator Walter Mondale of Minnesota went down to defeat, Carter failing to carry even his home state, Mondale carrying Minnesota, and the Democrats were stunned by only carrying the District of Columbia, Hawaii and West Virginia.
Well, there’s a peek at my parallel universe. I like it here. :)
So he can get some “writer cred”, someone should inform this dude that the term is “Ever since”, not “Every since”..................................I think it depends on which universe your actually in..........Suppose you lived in Phuket,Thailand. Wouldn’t you have a different prospective ?.......get outta the program and back into the programme man !
I am sure that you will like this thread!
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
A lot of the best (and a lot of other) Science Fiction has been written on the theme of Alternate or Parallel Universes. Witers including Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein, Poul Anderson, H. Beam Piper, and Harry Turtledove have written extensively on this theme.
One of the earliest examples was ‘Bring the Jubilee’, in which the South won the Civil War (Newt Gingrich has expanded on this idea in recent ficion). Other histories have included Rome never falling, Cyrus the Great never being born, and the Aryans, instead of invading Europe and South Asia, instead invading the Americas, conquering the Amerindians before any pre-Columbian civilization had occurred (Just as a side point the Indus Valley civilization would have lived and prospered).
This makes my hair hurt.
But I seriously doubt that a way to test alternate-universe theory will ever be discovered. Not in this universe, anyway!
Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Eternity Road
Time travel pings.......
I would like to live in a parallel universe where I am the stay-home father of Ann Coulter’s children.
“Parallel universes really do exist, according to a mathematical discovery.”
The one good thing to come from Bill Clinton’s presidency is that we learned to pay close attention to what is really said.
The quote above does not say it is proof parallel universes exist. It says a mathematical discovery indicates they do. This is a long way from being “proof” or even “significant”.
Basically, a mathematical construct assuming parallel universes exists explains certain quantum behavior. As the number of possible explanations for this quantum behavior is infinite and this is but one, we are a long way from needing to worry about the existence of parallel universes.
Last night I was reading a CREVO thread. The contrast with this one is striking. It was the usual suspects hurling insults at one another, talking about how ID cannot be a theory or how Darwinism is only a theory, not a fact, etc.
If I accept your statement here (and I do), I see the basis for pursuing any theory to try to match data and observation to it, rather than simply saying that is can't be. I wonder how the CREVO discussions would be different if the would only take your approach... let's set up the theories and look at the evidence and continue to challenge both theories. It will never be settled, but inquiry could continue on both theories.
Ah well, perhaps that is happening in one of those parallel universes.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.