Tuning the Universe: Alien Design and Oscillatory Universe

In my last post (Tuning the Universe: Constants)  we talked about a fine tuned Universe which is in a way  perfectly suitable for our existence.  We also created a hypothetical Universe where some of the constants were slightly or drastically different and analyzed its effects on our perception of reality. But the question that was left unanswered was “Who did this fine tuning?” or “Is it a mere coincidence?” You might wonder about the possible candidates for fine tuning that I mentioned in my previous post and how one would work this problem out.

Theologians keep arguing about a Divine Creator who turns a few knobs of constants to tune this Universe until it reaches a perfect configuration to sustain human life. The argument comes from the rare possibility of constants attaining those stable values by themselves. Lets have a look at two such theories on fine tuning.

Alien Design

You all might be familiar with Engineers from the movie Prometheus and how Elizabeth Shaw led a mission to a faraway mysterious alien planet seeking the underlying truth about our very own existence, funded by a multibillionaire in search of immortality. Ancients called them God but actually they were a technologically far superior alien civilization. What if that is true?

One hypothesis about fine-tuning is that universe was designed and fine tuned by highly advanced aliens. This solves the problem of Universe fine tuning it by itself. To understand this imagine after a few centuries and with the current exponentially increasing pace of technological advancement we reach a point where our supercomputers surpass the combined potential of every single human that ever lived. The knowledge of physics reaches beyond the understanding of the Universe and we can explore the hidden dimensions, biochemistry and biology unlocking the basic design rules for all the organic life forms., That will be the time we ourselves will be capable enough to create an artificial universe or life –  using all the correct ingredients. Artificial Universe is something outside our dimension or within a computer simulation or maybe outside our universe, there is a vast possibility and uncertainty where this universe can exist. That universe will not require an abstract fine tuning because we already know what constants are stable and would have figured out the missing pieces in the next few centuries. Quite similarly it is possible that our universe itself is a product of such calculated design. Those super advanced aliens could have eventually learned to engineer a new Universe and we could have emerged in one of those, deliberately or as a byproduct.

Theologists take this hypothesis in their defense and call it a certain proof of a God. But they miss the argument that even a super advanced alien race is a product of Darwinian Evolution and thus no different than we humans. And certainly in religious concepts God is a supernatural power with no concept of something before or after him, but here our intelligent guys are nothing but simply an advanced alien race. So, don’t confuse Alien Design with Creationism. In the words of Richard Dawkins, the famous author of ‘The God delusion’:

” It could be that at some earlier time, somewhere in the universe, a civilization evolved, probably by some kind of Darwinian means, probably to a very high level of technology, and designed a form of life that they seeded onto perhaps this planet.”

Alien Design is quite a fascinating hypothesis that can’t be denied because if you look at the Universe, physics, biochemistry or biology, you will find a signature of some kind of a fine-tuning or a designer. It’s kind of a fingerprint, of the Designer.

Oscillatory universe

Thanks to the Big Bang Theory we all are familiar with the Big Bang, but you might not be aware of the term ‘The Big Crunch’.

To recap, Big bang is an abrupt expansion of the universe from a very small, hot and dense state or singularity (which is an infinitely high energy and density at zero volume), whereas Big Crunch is the collapse of the same universe almost to singularity once it reaches the maximum point of expansion. And if the Oscillatory Universe theory is true, our Universe is something that exists between a never ending cycle of a Big Bang and a Big Crunch. Or you can say that our universe can be the first of a possible series of universes or it can be the nth universe in the series.

Some physicists don’t believe that universe reaches singularity after Big crunch but it bounces back to an expanding one due to the infinite repulsive forces, thus expansion followed by Collapse and so on. One bounce represents end of the previous universe and it is quite possible that every time one cycle completes the laws of physics reset themselves to same or different values of constants and thus providing every following universe with a new set of constants. Or we are here discussing about these constants because eventually there turned out to be one universe out of those n number of universes which supports the evolution of intelligent beings. Oscillatory universe theory raised many questions about the way universe work and our purpose in it, in a constant search for answers physicists stumbled upon something beyond our understanding, Dark matters and Dark energy. If mass of all the visible materials is calculated then it constitutes only 4% of the total mass of the Universe, and rest is invisible. That invisible mass is Dark energy and Dark matter, we can’t see them but can indirectly observe their effect on galaxies and space. For Big Crunch it’s necessary for gravity to slow down the expansion of the Universe and collapse it back, but that is not happening and expansion of the Universe is accelerating at an increased rate, and the reason is Dark Energy.  With the new findings about Dark Energy and Dark Matter Oscillatory Universe hypothesis doesn’t stand strong and probably the Universe will end in a Big Freeze, without collapsing and without giving us a second chance.

In my next post we will discuss about more fine tuning candidates like Multiverse theory, Simulation Hypothesis and Alternate realities.

 

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An Unimaginable Scale

We all know Earth is huge. But where it stands on a cosmic scale? There are billions of Sun like stars in our Milkyway, and there are billions of Milkyway like galaxies in the VISIBLE UNIVERSE. Say if the Visible Universe is equivalent to all the sand found on Earth, then we are not more than a single grain of sand.

Watch and know it by yourself.

 

 

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The Model of Universe – Before Physics

As a kid I grew up with enough questions to keep me occupied for the rest of my life. Questions about those little shiny things in the night sky when there was absolute darkness. Like me, everyone of you at least once asked this same question while looking up to those stars. Everyone at least for once wondered from where they all came and what is beyond them.

Well, both Theologists and Physicists have their own opinion and the one you find logically acceptable is totally upon you. My purpose here is not to argue about your belief in a divine creator or God but to give you enough reasons to look beyond the well established beliefs and group thinking that we have since the beginning of time.

ANCIENT BELIEF

This is my first post of the series and I would like to start this story with some ancient beliefs about the Universe and how they changed over time.

It’s fascinating how once some monkey decided to throw a stone and it somehow evolved us to Humans, who keep pondering about the vast possibilities and purpose of our lives. Personally I always find evolution and history as exciting as a roller coaster ride, the only difference is that you are safe here and you don’t have to worry about the person puking next to you. While you are reading history you not only just unfold time but visit the frozen past and that’s the closest we can reach to time travel, for now. Before us there existed civilizations who marveled beyond the imagination even with their limited tools in the field of Architecture, Medicine, Science and Literature. The one thing they were not able to completely solve was the Universe and how it works and thus they resolved to a well defined tool, God.

Of all the written history dating back up to 3200 B.C., Mesopotamian civilization is one of the oldest civilizations. Throughout history Mesopotamia was dominated by either Sumerians or Akkadians (Mesopotamia is the name of the Civilizations that thrived between river  Tigris and Euphrates) . They were great mathematicians and doctors. The credit to current time scale of 60 Seconds, 60 minute, 24 Hours and 7 Days goes to them for inventing a sexagesimal numeral system. Inspite of their great scientific achievements they had very limited resources to figure out the true nature of the Universe. Mesopotamians believed earth as a flat world  floating like a raft on the Primordial Ocean which in turn is inside a blue dome to keep out the chaos. Their idea of cosmos, suggested  planets in circular motion with both heaven and earth coupled together for eternity. Faith and ideas mostly relied on the Gods whom they believed fabricated the 7 pairs of Heaven and Earth. The world they believed in was a watery world where a dome shaped firmament that practically kept them safe from heavenly water pouring down. Sun, Moon and stars were thought to be hanging from this heavenly ceiling. The model of universe they dictated was a simple observation and in response to existing religious beliefs.

Later Ancient Greeks also shared a similar model of the universe. Greek cosmologies were intimately related to mythology that earth was surrounded by air above, water around and Hades below and Ether (Chaos from Mesopotamian model) surrounded the earth-water-Hades set. For thousands of years the idea of a Godly universe was blindly followed and worshiped. This is a classic example of what ‘group thinking’ does to the people. We get occupied with an idea and dare not to think beyond it just because we are afraid to conflict the beliefs of a group or the prevalent religion.

Hindus had a model of the universe where they thought the Universe came from an Anda(egg) which in turn originated from the Navel of the lord Vishnu who used to float in vast nothingness of space with his Shesnag (A large Snake with 5 Or 7 heads). The model they followed was similar to that of other civilizations, with Earth defined as a pivotal point.

I am not much of a religious guy, but usually I prefer going through religious manuscripts and writings NOT to understand religion but to understand the Knowledge and Technology our ancients shared and built upon. Recently, I found a Slokah (a form of poem) from an ancient Hindu Manuscript which probably talks about parallel universes and life of the universe. I don’t  mean it’s completely true. I am not sure whether it’s even a correct interpretation or fabricated, but it surely caught my attention

“One cycle of existence is around 311 trillion years and the life of one universe around 8 billion years. This Universal cycle is preceded by an infinite number of universes and to be followed by another infinite number of universes. Includes an infinite number of universes at one given time.” ~ Rigveda

Well, this all went well for thousands of years until people like Copernicus stumbled upon Physics and started questioning the existing model, beliefs and later on proposed a heliocentric model where Sun is at the center and all planets(including earth) go around it. This one thing shattered the very roots of the Earth Pivotal Universe model and ignited a hidden revolution of curiosity and science. From that day this model is refined and perfected from Kepler to Stephen Hawkins to the recent Cyclic Model of string theorists. All this and the future possibilities we will discuss in the next post. There was a time when followers of science were slammed with blasphemy, hunted and crucified. Now, the same religion is desperately trying to unify science and God using Quantum Mechanics and Consciousness.

If you are still reading this, now let me tell you the purpose of this first post. This post is just to let you know about the beliefs I share and beliefs I hate, so you get the insight to the purpose of this blog and decide whether to follow the upcoming posts or not.

 

But if you are going to follow the blog I would like to give you an idea about the upcoming post.

The Model of Universe – Modern Belief

Time 0: Planks time

Time 1: Big Bang, Breaking of symmetry and appearance of the fundamental Laws and Constants, Space and Time.

Time 2: Expansion, Forms, Shape and inflation

Time 3: Present scenario, dark matter, dark energy, parallel Universes

Time 4: Big Freeze, Big Collapse, The End of Time

Time 5: Beyond Time

Time X: We are not REAL.

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