Many Worlds and No Gods

exposes a major departure on the part of physicists arising from the realization that there is no single theory, or for that reason, a single reality, that can be ascribed to the universe.
This post was published on the now-closed HuffPost Contributor platform. Contributors control their own work and posted freely to our site. If you need to flag this entry as abusive, send us an email.

I have just finished reading The Grand Design, the latest book by Stephen Hawking co-authored with Leonard Mlodinow, a Caltech physicist. Though all the ideas in the book have been debated earlier in the scientific community, the Hawking effect on the readers and the ensuing attention has already been felt. The book exposes a major departure on the part of physicists arising from the realization that there is no single theory or for that reason a single reality that can be ascribed to the universe.

Perhaps, the public interest in the book stems from an old sacred formula for marketing -- science and religion. Even though the book doesn't go deep into any such debates, which many physicists believe is unnecessary anyway, it explains how the creation of the universe or universes could be explained by the laws of physics. The omnipresent force of gravity can do a better job in comprehending the act creation in a logical way than myths or religions could do. In other words, the intervention of a divine being, God, is not required for the creation or existence of the universes.

That proposition about the creation of the universe doesn't mean the authors assert God doesn't exist. In fact, on Larry King Live, Hawking says, "God may exist but science can explain the universe without the need for a creator."

The authors employ M-theory, a composite version of different string theories to reach that conclusion. But it comes with a heavy price. One such penalty is that our universe must be just one of the many universes that sprang from the initial chaos. M-theory even estimates the number of such universes as 10^500, and ours happened to be just one among those many universes.

The string theory, thought to be the theory of everything, has lost its glory in unifying all the forces of nature. The theorists are somewhat lost in the strange landscape they created. Many different versions of string theories emerged in the past. M-theory is a network of all different versions of the string theory. The authors bet on model-dependent realism, suggesting philosophy is dead, and declare there is no single description of reality. Each universe will have its own laws of physics and possibly different dimensions. The absolute laws of nature must be called apparent laws since they vary from universe to universe.

The book goes on explaining, "Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist, and it is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue torch and set the universe going."

Many world theories and extra dimensions are nothing new to physics, and even the signature of extra dimensions is sought in the high energy experiments, but without any success so far. Finally, M-theory will also face the challenges of experimental verification.

Overall, the book is a breezy read compared to previous works such as Brief or Briefer History of Time. But, is it the final word on the cosmological creations? My answer is an astounding "no." The book is an account of modern cosmological evolution to explain the universe -- an attempt undertaken by Newton and Einstein in the past and has been ongoing.

So, how do the modern cosmological ideas differ from the views of classical physicists? Isaac Newton, the father of gravity, attempted to explain how the universe works with his mathematical equations. He didn't bother to know why it works because for him it was an act of God. Einstein revolutionized the Newtonian thinking by rewriting the absoluteness of space and time that Newton believed. Yet, he dreamed of a single elegant theory that could describe the fundamental realty.

Now, the followers of those giants struggle to look for a single or many theories to explain why the universe works rather than how it works. It is interesting to note that while people are debating about many Gods on our single planet, the physicists suggest that there could be many worlds without the requirement of even a single God.

Popular in the Community

Close

What's Hot