Fecund universes and non-local hidden variables

[bascule]

Could fecund universes provide the seed data for non-local hidden variables which could deterministically describe apparent quantum indeterminacy?

 

Could seeming randomness in fact simply be the result of a complex heritage of parent universes, each one more complex than the next?

 

My reasoning is as follows:

 

If the fecund universes hypothesis is correct, and the formation of a black hole creates a new universe, then the most statistically likely universe is one which comes from a line of universes that generate a lot of holes.

 

Black holes are formed from stars. More stars means more black holes.

 

If apparent quantum indeterminacy is the reason for the non-uniformity of the Big Bang, and such uniformity is what resulted in our clumpy, star-filled universe, then perhaps such indeterminacy evolved in a series of successive universes, each one clumpier than the last.

[Spyman]

Well, I asked you in another thread:

Maybe it evolved from another universe[/url']...

In this view, a collapsing black hole causes the emergence of a new universe on the "other side", whose fundamental constant parameters (speed of light, Planck length and so forth) may differ slightly from those of the universe where the black hole collapsed. Each universe therefore gives rise to as many new universes as it has black holes.

 

So where does the energy for every sub-universe come from in this theory ?

 

Will these baby universes contain less and less energy since the black holes will become smaller and smaller or is there an outside universal energy source ?

What needs to be considered is: In the case of a heritage then such a line of evolution would be finite.

 

There could be an infinite masteruniverse, with infinite numbers of subuniverses, but since every new universe will contain less energy, all lines will die out at some point when they contain to little energy to form a new 'baby'.

 

In my opinion I think it's easier to use Occams razor and cut off the complexity with infinite subuniverses and dimensions -> It's more likely to have only one single serie of evolving universes.

 

And before you or someone else points it out to me: With a single oscillating line of universes, it's also thought to end, in heat death from the build up of entropy, (the second law of thermodynamics).

But so would the masteruniverse also and problably in the same timespan.

[Spyman]

No reply this time either... Hit and Run Tactics or what ???

[5614]

bascule is not a "hit and run" guy! Maybe he doesn't have a reply, or his query is answered or he just forgot about this thread... but he's a respectable guy, been here for over a year and a half, almost 3000 posts (nearly all of which are quality posts) etc.

[jackson33]

first off all stars don't create black holes. only very large stars and then just what they absorb is wide open for debate. any thought of a BH to form a universe must include the thought of a worm hole or some escape from this universe. (science fiction). then in universal time the process for the death of the star to evaporation is not long enough to absorb matter for a good size dwarf galaxy much less a spiral or then a universe. this evaporation explained in the process would not in itself mean any major force or event.

 

i don't disagree the evaporation process could generate the process to form other units such as stars or even a galaxy but more likely it rambles through space and finds or is attracted to larger amounts and then the process begins.

 

on the size of a star that is thought to form a BH. they are 20-25 times ours and condense to about the size of our star, with the gravity of the original. actually very few stars are the size required to form BH and from what little i know its closer to 2 in a billion then to any other guess.

 

if your getting to some thought of a BH and the formation of our universe, i would only say the big bang theory also has conflicting opinion and that theory is one in progress. I'll only admit its apparently accepted and that i question...why?

 

the idea of multi or even substantial numbers of universe is fine. so long as there is no reason not to be the idea sounds fine.

[Martin]

Well, I asked you in another thread:

 

t has black holes.

 

So where does the energy for every sub-universe come from in this theory ?

.

 

It does not need to come from anywhere, spyman,

 

there is no energy conservation law that applies here.

 

but since every new universe will contain less energy,

 

that is not true, actually.

 

there is no reason that a new universe should have less energy than the parent

 

 

there is a Usenet sci.physics.research (SPR) FAQ about the limited applicability of energy conservation in Gen Rel and cosmology. I don't remember which at the moment. One place you could find it is at John Baez website.

 

Inflation scenarios can violate energy conservation. I mean hugely.

Say there is a "dark energy" or scalar field with a constant energy density per unit volume----and suddenly the volume increases by 50 orders of magnitude. So the amount of energy increases by 50 orders of magnitude.

 

energy cons. is being violated by expanding universe and constant dark energy density as we speak, on a huge scale.

 

also energy cons. is being violated by the CMB. CMB photons get redshifted by the expansion of space. This deprives them of energy.

the redshift of the CMB is 1100

 

that means that each photon has lost about 1099/1100 of the energy it had to start with. and each CMB photon now has only 1/1100 of the energy it started with. there are a huge number of CMB photons and it is a big amount of lost energy. It did not GO anywhere.

 

It just does not exist any more. It did not need to go anywhere because there is no such thing as global energy conservation in a Gen Rel context.

 

I find it bemusing. Maybe someone will come up with an explanation and John Baez can change the FAQ at his website.

[bascule]

No reply this time either... Hit and Run Tactics or what ???

 

Sorry, didn't see this until today, and I've been posting rather infrequently lately due to work.

 

But uhh, I defer to Martin. Fecund universes involve a sort of transformation which, according to the hypothesis, alters physical law itself, so any physical laws we experience now won't necessary apply to fecund universes or their creation

[Kygron]

...energy cons. is being violated by expanding universe and constant dark energy density ... So the amount of energy increases...

 

...photons get redshifted by the expansion of space. This deprives them of energy...

 

Does that mean that the universe is using this method to recycle its energy? Surely broken energy conservation laws would change the course of power generation technologies and... uh... ALL OF CONVENTIONAL PHYSICS!

[Martin]

Does that mean that the universe is using this method to recycle its energy? Surely broken energy conservation laws would change the course of power generation technologies and... uh... ALL OF CONVENTIONAL PHYSICS!

 

My feeling (and this is just a feeling because I don't understand it) is that it DOESN'T change the local conventional picture.

 

A very rough analogy would be with that other law, the c speed limit.

 

We can rely on that holding locally. No particle with mass will ever catch up with a photon.

 

But we still know that the recession speeds of very distant objects can be many times faster than the speed of light.

 

(this doesnt do us any good, it holds no hope for us of making superluminal spaceships etc.)

=================

 

My feeling is that just because inflation scenarios (a widely accepted idea) involve making energy, this does not hold any hope to us of free energy.

 

Alan Guth (one of those who invented the inflation idea) is often quoted as saying "the Universe may be the Ultimate Free Lunch". He was referring to this thing that during inflation much of the energy that eventually goes into making stars and stuff seems to appear out of nowhere with the expansion of space.

 

But I think you realize as well as I do, Kygron, that part of what we are looking at here is IMPERFECTION IN OUR CURRENT KNOWLEDGE.

 

I feel like we are confronting big patches of unknown. there is a lot more to say but it is late here and I'm getting sleepy. there are a lot of puzzles.

[Martin]

... the formation of a black hole creates a new universe, then the most statistically likely universe is one which comes from a line of universes that generate a lot of holes.

 

Black holes are formed from stars. More stars means more black holes.

...

 

I wanted to add something to that. There was something you didnt mention.

This proposal is the only empirical multiverse scenario that I know of.

 

In the sense that it makes testable predictions----which, if future observations turn out against, would shoot it down.

 

All the other multiverse ideas that I've encountered have an unfalsifiable anthropic element in them----that the universe is only explained to be how it is because it is hospitable to life and otherwise we wouldnt be here to see---and this can never be falsified because we will never observe anything that would make it impossible for us to exist. So these other multiverse theories do not make any testable falsifiable prediction about the unknown result of a future observation and therefore in that respect they are all unscientific garbage---have an element of fantasy or creation myth that is alien to scientific tradition

 

they don't fit into the 400 year tradition of science that goes back to Francis Bacon who got the idea that theories should be testable empirically.

 

whatever you think of this smolin multiverse idea, it at least predicts things which you can check for, that might turn out against, and shoot it down----that, for me, is the kicker and why it is an interesting theory.

 

it predicts, for example, that you won't ever see a neutron star more than 2.5 solar masses (or some number, I forget the exact number)

 

this has been, in effect, being tested ever since 1994 when Smolin proposed the theory and made that prediction.

 

because, if tomorrow somebody observes a neutron star of, say, 3 solar masses, that will show that some Standard Model physics parameters could be "improved" namely adjusted so that a Mass 3 neutron star would collapse---which would make black holes more abundant (more stars would form into them)

 

there has been considerable discussion of this---I'm don't have expertise so I just refer to the paper by Rudy Vaas which has a large bibliography and critically examines the whole predictive empirically testable issue.

 

the overall prediction this theory makes, or the general open challenge, is that you can't discover a direction in which to adjust the parameters of the standard model which would initially increase abundance of stellar collapse to BH.

 

If someone rises to that challenge and does discover an adjustment that would result in an immediate rise in prevalence of stellar collapse, that would refute it. (Because nature would already have evolved along that upwards slope, in Smolin's picture.)

 

this year Andrei Vilenkin thought he had a way to do it and posted a paper claiming to shoot down Smolin's idea, but it didn't work-----it purported to increase the abundance of BH formed not by stellar collapse but by "quantum fluctuation" which doesn't seem to have been very convincing. Vilenkin advocates an alternative (non-empirical) multiverse idea. "inflation produces lots and we just happen to live in the one we do"

 

it is a good sign, though, that a prominent cosmologist like Vilenkin is grappling with the problem and trying to refute Smolin multiverse. When people try seriously to defeat it, it shows that the idea is alive

 

to get those papers, anyone who wants to see them, go to

http://arxiv.org/find

and type Vilenkin into the author box

 

or type Vaas into the author box. that should be enough (Vaas paper was back in 2002 or 2003)

 

I don't either believe or disbelieve Smolin's scenario----I just acknowledge that it is testable (so it belongs to real science) and it has survived over 10 years without being shot down by observations. So I look on it with curiosity and respect.

[Spyman]

Hi Martin and thanks for your thorough explanation.

 

What you are saying is that in Smolin's scenario there is unlimited energy and all sub-universes could be infinite in mass and size ?

 

I happened to stumble over this, before my reply to bascule:

A more current view of white holes takes into consideration a revision to the standard model of the big bang theory which states that the big bang is an explosion that happens within a black hole, with the expansion that follows the traditional interpretation of the big bang, expanding into infinite space inside the black hole. Or in other words, a miniature universe is created at the core of the black hole, which expands into extra dimensions outside of this universe. The expansion taking place in this new miniature universe, if it could be perceived from an observer from this universe, could be looked at as a white hole. Matter that could not escape the intense gravitational pull of the black hole in this universe is instead sent speeding into the newly expanding baby universe. Using that logic, one could assume that our universe itself is a white hole. Hypothetically, this model could be used to explain the increasing rate of expansion of this universe: as matter from our parent universe is engulfed by our parent black hole (the black hole that created our universe), our own universe is fed this matter which could possibly have something to do with dark matter and dark energy, which currently is thought to contribute to the increase in the rate of our universe's expansion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_hole

 

So I wrongly assumed they talked about Smolin's Fecund universes, but I suppose it's one of many spinn-off's from his idea ?

 

And I think that answeres bascule's question to, then there is no need for such a hertigage either.

 

---------------------------------

 

Personally I don't like this "Free Lunch" idea so I would like you to clarify a few things a little more...

 

1. You claim that "energy conservation is being violated by expansion and constant dark energy density", but later on you reply to Kygron that there is an "IMPERFECTION IN OUR CURRENT KNOWLEDGE".

 

How certain are we that there is a violation and not a misunderstanding or lack of knowledge ?

 

2. You also claim that the energy lost from the CMB due to expansion "did not GO anywhere", but in another thread I was told that in GR "light has to do work to climb up from a gravity well".

 

Could it not be viewed as the light sent out inside a past and more dense universe and arrives now, infact have climbed up from a gravity well ?

 

---------------------------------

 

I your last post you mention the ability to "shoot down" Smolin's theory and I wonder how it will fit togheter with the big bounce theory you mention in other threads.

 

Words like "the idea of gravity being in equilibrium with compaction" inside black holes seems to contradict the possibility of sub-universes inside them.

 

Can the theories coexist or will one of them have to go ?

[Severian]

C

If the fecund universes hypothesis is correct, and the formation of a black hole creates a new universe

 

Could you please explain the mechanism for this creation of 'new universes' from black holes? I am not even very sure what you mean by 'universe' in this context.

[Martin]

1. You claim that "energy conservation is being violated by expansion and constant dark energy density", but later on you reply to Kygron that there is an "IMPERFECTION IN OUR CURRENT KNOWLEDGE".

 

How certain are we that there is a violation and not a misunderstanding or lack of knowledge ?

 

That's right. We can't be certain. It is my personal opinion that current knowledge is imperfect---I have no idea how the various issues will be resolved.

 

It is common knowledge that in the context of GR you do not have global energy conservation. Try John Baez site "Physics FAQ" (more reliable than Wikipedia) IIRC lot of discussion. the point is that you simply cannot prove energy conservation from that starting point.

 

So if you study cosmology, where they work with dynamic geometry, where space expands etc., you have to give up energy conservation.

 

YOU STILL HAVE LOCAL CONSERVATION. If you put a box around a region of approximately flat space, small compared to cosmological distances, then inside that box everything is going to be as usual.

 

Personally I too find the situation unsatisfactory. I would be delighted if theorists would discover another form of energy that the energy which is lost from the CMB "goes into"----so that everything stays constant. But they havent done that yet.

 

2. You also claim that the energy lost from the CMB due to expansion "did not GO anywhere", but in another thread I was told that in GR "light has to do work to climb up from a gravity well".

 

Could it not be viewed as the light sent out inside a past and more dense universe and arrives now, infact have climbed up from a gravity well ?

 

Well that is a creative idea of yours, spyman! You have come up with an inventive proposal to resolve the seeming anomaly.

 

It is not consistent with the way cosmologists analyze the problem (they don't consider the early universe was in a gravity well relative to us and explain the redshift that way) but perhaps you should not be put off by this. Perhaps you should think more along those lines.

 

But keep in mind that people have had this problem to worry about for many decades and smart people have thought about it and there is still (among the professionals) no answer AFAIK. the CMB has lost 1100/1101 (nearly all) of its original energy and nobody has a clear explanation of where that energy "went".

 

I would be delighted to be proved wrong, if anyone does a search and comes up with a valid solution! It would be fascinating. (But I'll be the judge whether what is found succeeds as a solution )

 

Spyman, I think your analysis is actually in conflict with the way the Integrated Sachs Wolfe effect is usually treated. As photons go into a dense region they pick up energy, then expansion causes the region to dissipate and they get out having GAINED energy. Their having been in a denser region earlier, before expansion, does not cost them anything. You seem to be saying that it would cost.

 

 

 

I your last post you mention the ability to "shoot down" Smolin's theory and I wonder how it will fit togheter with the big bounce theory you mention in other threads.

 

Words like "the idea of gravity being in equilibrium with compaction" inside black holes seems to contradict the possibility of sub-universes inside them.

 

 

By Smolin's theory I guess you mean what he calls CNS (cosmological natural selection).

It has been standing since 1994 and has not been shot down yet. Vilenkin tried this year but did not succeed. Every time someone measures the mass of a neutron star there is a chance it will go against CNS prediction, but it hasnt yet.

 

But CNS could be shot down tomorrow. THIS WOULD NOT AFFECT the cosmological bounce models developed in LQC (loop quantum cosmology).

The bounce models do not need to involve black holes. they just extend time back into a crunch---they don't say what it was that crunched

 

You say "gravity being in equilbrium with compaction"---I don't know what that means in this context. It may make sense in some other context.

 

Can the theories coexist or will one of them have to go ?

 

Not sure what theories you are talking about. If there are two theories and they make contradictory predictions then one or both are wrong and need to be replaced, and in principle one can test by observation, since they make different predictions.

 

Anyway, thanks for all the questions!

[Spyman]

It is common knowledge that in the context of GR you do not have global energy conservation.

I will have to accept the fact that science don't have an explanation, (yet).

 

And I am somewhat worried that mainstream seems to take an approach where global energy conservation is not needed. Maybe I will change attitude when I have more/better knowledge/understanding but for the moment I will stick to the conservation laws.

 

I will visit John Baez site "Physics FAQ" when I have more time.

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/

 

It is not consistent with the way cosmologists analyze the problem

OK, that is something I don't have any problem accepting, I learn more by being wrong than when correct, I will check out the Integrated Sachs Wolfe effect.

 

Not sure what theories you are talking about.

Sorry if I made an unclear question.

 

Is there an possibility that LQC, (Loop Quantum Cosmology), or some other quantum gravity theory may shoot down Smolin's theory CNS, (Cosmological Natural Selection) ?

 

This is still speculative, but according to the theory of quantum gravity a singularity is not formed. Instead, space and time do not collapse to a point but rather into a (four-dimensional) tube which opens into an entirely new region of space and time. The singularity "bounces" back out into a big bang. This means it is entirely possible that our own universe was created when a black hole was formed in another universe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_natural_selection

 

The Big Bounce is an event derived from the oscillatory universe interpretation of the Big Bang where the first cosmological event was the result of the collapse of a previous universe. Also, if the universe is closed, this theory would predict that once this incarnation of the universe collapses it will spawn another universe in an event similar to the Big Bang after a universal singularity is reached.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bounce

 

They might be conflicting but could also support each other...

 

"gravity being in equilbrium with compaction" is your own words from one of the LQC's threads, Smolin's model needs a lot of bounces, but what if LQC predicts that black holes don't bounce and only compacts towards equilbrium ?

 

And the quantum gravity models will probably put some constraints on the "tube" which may also support or shoot it down.

 

I guess what I am asking for is more or less a "speculation".

[Martin]

...

...

Is there an possibility that LQC, (Loop Quantum Cosmology), or some other quantum gravity theory may shoot down Smolin's theory CNS, (Cosmological Natural Selection) ?

 

This is still speculative, but according to the theory of quantum gravity a singularity is not formed. Instead, space and time do not collapse to a point but rather into a (four-dimensional) tube which opens into an entirely new region of space and time. The singularity "bounces" back out into a big bang. This means it is entirely possible that our own universe was created when a black hole was formed in another universe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_natural_selection

 

The Big Bounce is an event derived from the oscillatory universe interpretation of the Big Bang where the first cosmological event was the result of the collapse of a previous universe. Also, if the universe is closed, this theory would predict that once this incarnation of the universe collapses it will spawn another universe in an event similar to the Big Bang after a universal singularity is reached.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bounce

 

They might be conflicting but could also support each other...

 

"gravity being in equilbrium with compaction" is your own words from one of the LQC's threads, Smolin's model needs a lot of bounces, but what if LQC predicts that black holes don't bounce and only compacts towards equilbrium ?

 

And the quantum gravity models will probably put some constraints on the "tube" which may also support or shoot it down.

 

I guess what I am asking for is more or less a "speculation".

 

nice bunch of questions! It is quite true that LQG analysis of black holes could go either way----it could UNDERMINE the CNS idea or it could lend SUPPORT.

 

In fact there have been a dozen or more papers studying BH collapse making various assumptions and using LQG methods and there is still nothing conclusive.

 

If someone wants to look up the papers, just go to arxiv and search by author's name:

Martin Bojowald

Abhay Ashteker

Viqar Husain

Leonard Modesto

Parampreet Singh

 

But I don't urge anyone to go read papers at this point because it isn't at all conclusive. And when they complete the analysis (remove all the simplifying assumptions they make to get a grip on the problem) and finally get an answer about what BH endstate is---then it may support or go against CNS---and EVEN THEN it won't be final because one would still have to test empirically.

 

That is, for example, look at GRB (gammaray burst) flashes and see if they show a predicted pattern. Parampreet Singh has a paper or two about that. When you have a QG model of how a star collapses to form a black hole, it may say something about the release of energy and predict a certain signature which you can look for in GRBs.

 

=====================

 

You suggest that QG analysis of collapse-to-BH may ultimately decide the fate of CNS!

 

I think that is possible but it that way of deciding the fate of CNS is more long and involved than what I have in mind.

 

CNS when it was proposed in 1994 already made predictions which were empirically testable with observational means then available. The main CNS prediction is "you cannot find a way to change the fundamental parameters of physics so as to have more stars collapse to BH."

 

If you can find a way to adjust parameters (quark masses, relative strength of forces, the QED constant determining the periodic table of elements...) so as to make stars more likely to condense and ultimately collapse, that would show that the universe is NOT OPTIMIZED.

 

Various people have tried to do this and have argued about it for over 10 years. And people have been measuring the masses of neutron stars. Finding ones that are too massive would refute CNS because if the universe were optimized then those too-massive neutron stars would have already collapsed to BH. So people have, both intentionally and unintentionally, been testing CNS.

===============

 

So Spyman you ask if QG analysis could eventually refute CNS, and I say yes it certainly could, and I follow your reasoning, which is thoughtful and researched. that much is great.

 

but I still say that this what you are talking about is not the most DIRECT way to test and possibly refute CNS!

 

The CNS hypothesis, in most stripped-down essential form, is simply that the universe is optimized for stars to condense and eventually collapse.

 

Either it is optimal or it is not! REGARDLESS of how this optimization may or may not have happened! If it is optimal, that is very interesting and one can speculate that it could have happened by an evolutionary (reproductive) process and go on from there.

 

But let's not put cart before horse. The first thing to check is whether it is optimal!

 

This is very out-there and exposed to empirical refutation. If there is some sub-optimal aspect of the basic parameters, some way to improve the black-holiness of what we've got, we should be able to spot it. that is what the CNS hypothesis challenges to do.

 

I am not contradicting what you said, I'm just giving you my take on it (you basically asked for speculation )

[Spyman]

but I still say that this what you are talking about is not the most DIRECT way to test and possibly refute CNS!

I did not intend to advocate a 'duel' between them...

- I was only curious how they relate to each other.

 

But I have to admit that at first I though they couldn't coexist at all, so I was a 'little' surprised.

(to find out that QG even could lend support to CNS.)

I am not contradicting what you said, I'm just giving you my take on it (you basically asked for speculation )

For which I am very grateful, Thank you !