Famed mathematical physicist Sir Roger Penrose, who worked alongside Stephen Hawking for many years on furthering the developing Big Bang theory, has debunked Hawking’s ‘no-God-needed’ theory of the universe as “hardly science” and “not even a theory” on Premier Christian Radio.
Speaking on the station’s weekly faith debate program Unbelievable? on Saturday 25 September, Penrose described Hawking’s new book The Grand Design as “misleading” adding that M-theory, which Hawking claims has made God redundant as a cause of the universe, was “not even a theory” and “hardly science” but instead “a collection of hopes, ideas and aspirations.”
Penrose was in dialogue on the program with Alister McGrath, professor of theology at Kings College London. The two men joined host Justin Brierley to respond to the question of whether Hawking’s new theory had made God redundant as a potential explanation of the origin of the universe.
Criticizing M-theory, Penrose said: “It’s a collection of ideas, hopes, aspirations. The book is a bit misleading. It gives you this impression of a theory that is going to explain everything; it’s nothing of the sort. It’s not even a theory.”
Our Universe has not been shown to “create itself from nothing.”
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Asked whether science shows that the universe could “create itself from nothing” as claimed in the book, Penrose was strong in his condemnation of the ‘string’ theory that lies behind Hawking’s statement: “It’s certainly not doing it yet. I think the book suffers rather more strongly than many. It’s not an uncommon thing in popular descriptions of science to latch onto an idea, particularly things to do with string theory, which have absolutely no support from observation. They are just nice ideas.” He added that such ideas are “very far from any testability. They are hardly science.”
As a former colleague who worked closely alongside Hawking in developing gravitational singularity theorems, Penrose is perhaps the most high profile scientist yet to dismiss Hawking’s views.
“Multi-verse” has not superseded God
He also responded to the so-called “multi-verse” hypothesis that Hawking’s theory also posits. Christians, including Professor McGrath, have pointed towards the fact that our universe is incredibly “fine-tuned” for life to come into existence, thus providing evidence of a transcendent designer. Hawking’s “multi-verse” hypothesis is a form of the ‘anthropic principle’: since ours is one in an array of universes, we inevitably only observe a universe with the correct ‘settings’ that support conscious life.
Responding to the ‘multi-verse’ hypothesis, Penrose, a Distinguished Supporter of the British Humanist Association who describes himself as having “no religious beliefs,” said: “Its overused, and this is a place where its overused. It’s an excuse for not having a good theory.” [These ideas are not supportive of ‘no God is needed’ ideas either — although sometimes put forth in such a manner as to shed doubt on the God idea.]
Premier presenter Justin Brierley said: “What’s interesting is that Penrose’s criticisms of Hawking are not driven by any faith position. Instead he simply recognizes that the science does not justify making statements about God’s non-existence, which is a much more honest position than other well-known scientists, such as Dawkins, who want to equate science with atheism.”
Penrose’s own alternative view of the universe is detailed in his new book “Cycles of Time” published by The Bodley Head. As for myself, I am convinced that matter is connected together — every single subatomic particle of it — with its source — by a directedness energy that the source is — some call it love; I do.
“Life as we know it
is a thin layer of events
covering a deeper reality.”
~ Deepak Chopra
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Hebrews 11:3 Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
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Let there be light… Religious believe that God willed it, and at once there was light.
Quantum theory tells us that both light and matter consist of tiny particles which have wavelike properties associated with them. Light can be thought of as an electromagnetic wave that travels at the speed of light. However, light is also particles called photons. Albert Einstein first explained the photoelectric effect is proof that light exists in tiny packets of particles, which he called photons.
With Max Planck’s work on quanta of heat, Einstein went on to propose the most stunning idea of twentieth century physics. We live in a quantum universe, one built out of tiny, discrete chunks of energy and matter that seem to alternate as waves and particles. Light is composed of particles called photons, and matter is composed of particles of an atom called electrons, protons, and neutrons.
In 1919, six years before the invention of quantum mechanics and the uncertainty principle, Einstein showed that there would be a problem with the theories of cause and effect. The peculiar dual nature of quanta as both waves and particles might make it impossible, he warned, to definitively tie effects to their causes
Materialism is an atheistic philosophy that says that all of reality is reducible to matter and its interactions. It has gained ground because many people think that it’s supported by science. In reality, quantum mechanics says that even if we have complete information about the state of a physical system, the laws of physics typically only predict probabilities of future outcomes. These probabilities are called the “wave function” of the system.
Personally, I love it… that the real analysis; the actual science supports that something unnatural occurs and that is what forms matter. If you are a believer that science can explain precisely how it works… well, it can’t. It is still a bit of a mystery. In fact its a mystery that science may never solve.
What is the most astounding scientific fact about the Universe — of all time?
Program Description Astrophysicist Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson is asked by a reader of TIME magazine, “What is the most astounding fact you can share with us about the Universe?” This was his answer. NOTE: I typed the transcript at the end of this post.
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I posted several articles previously that highlight some tremendous accomplishments by Albert Einstein (listed below). This one is about dreams that Albert Einstein could not transform into a unifying theory for reality — evidence strongly indicates this was his greatest desire.
His work and the stimulation that he applied in vigorous debates and with encouragements for his colleagues did however make the pain tolerable.
First, lets review his momentum.
In 1905, Einstein published exceptional papers that proposed the existence of the photon as an elementary particle associated with electromagnetic radiation (light), detailed photoelectric effect, demonstrated the existence of atoms, wrote an introduction to special relativity, and published the paper that led to the famous E=MC² equation that defines matter as condensed energy. He continued work and in 1907, he developed the first quantum theory of specific heats and from 1907 to 1915, Einstein developed the theory of general relativity.
The Danish physicist, Niels Bohr provided in 1913 a quantum idea to explain the actions of electrons inside atoms. Einstein recognized that a quantum theory may be used to explain the characteristic light as emitted by atoms and that a great discovery had been made. He referred to Bohr’s work as “the highest form of musicality in the sphere of thought.”
In 1915, Einstein introduced the General Theory of Relativity. According to this revolutionary theory space and time are not Absolute. Space-time is not a fixed background for events. Instead, dynamic quantities of matter and energy form matter in ways that are unclear to this day. Einstein’s finding proves that space-time are defined within the universe — only. Further, his findings also prove matter is highly concentrated energy.
Matter is actually energy condensed to a slow vibration. Watch this:
Program Description
With his famous equation E=MC², Albert Einstein proved that when you come right down to it everything in the universe is energy. Both in the physical plane of our reality of matter and the abstract reality of our mind are made up of energy patterns.
The concept of a universal energy flow is not a new one. The ancient Chinese called this flow chi; the ancient Hindus called it prana. The disciplines that developed in those two cultures – t’ai chi and yoga, respectively- are based on the art of tuning in to the flow of energy and using it to centre the self.
Particle physicists try to understand the nature of nature at the smallest scales possible. Today, we know that atoms do not represent the smallest unit of matter. Particles called quarks and leptons seem to be the fundamental building blocks – but perhaps there is something even smaller.
Empty space, we have discovered, is actually not empty at all.
Astrophysicists have found that less than 10 percent of the mass of the entire universe consists of the kind of “luminous” matter that we can see. What is the dark matter that makes up the rest of the universe? How can we find out? Though we understand many important properties of the fundamental building blocks of our universe, there are untold mysteries still to solve.
Advances in technology allow physicists to build more powerful and sophisticated instruments to look deeper and deeper inside matter. Like adventurers entering unknown territory, physicists forge ahead into ever smaller dimensions.
What will be their next discovery?
Spoken by Deepak Chopra
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It took many years to finish and then prove general relativity. Indeed however, the effort paid off. The GPS on your phone couldn’t work without General Relativity. He made discovery possible for the mathematics of using redshifts (traces of movements) of distant galaxies to discover how the universe is expanding. General Relativity includes Einstein’s 10 field equations (EFE) that aided Monseigneur Georges Lemaître‘s proposal of what’s known as the Big Bang theory and also for predictions for the existence of black holes. Without his equations there would not be gravitational lensing that is presently being used to do research as to how dark matter may influence the universe. Other areas such a nuclear power and discovery of massive objects that distort space-time such as neutron stars that have too little luminosity also are managed because of Einstein’s General Relativity mathematics.
As Einstein was becoming aware of what was a new atomic theory, by 1915 having the Bohr (quantum) model of the atom, he understood that energy levels of electrons are predictably discrete and that electrons revolve in orbits around an atomic nucleus but that the electron can jump from one energy level (or orbit) to another. So, by 1916 Einstein devised a vastly improved fundamental statistical theory of heat that proved itself based on the quantum of energy. His theory predicted that as light passed through a substance it could stimulate the emission of more light. This effect is at the heart of the modern laser.
Einstein’s studies revealed the possibility of making a powerful light amplifier.
Modern lasers have thousands of practical applications based on this. Lasers are great aids in research as scientists explore theories and work further to discover the nature of our universe.
By 1925 a quantum theory of physics emerged by the collective creation of a generation of theoretical physicists from many nations. Scientists were collaborating and debating how to interpret the mechanics of quantum atoms. They already sensed the vast importance of the work they were doing.
Einstein took an active role in these discussions. Heisenberg, Bohr, and other creators of the theory insisted that the new theory provided for no meaningful way to discuss certain details of an atom’s behavior. For example, one could never predict the precise moment when an atom would emit a quantum of light. Einstein could not accept this lack of certainty; and he raised one objection after another. At the Solvay Conferences of 1927 and 1930 the debate between Bohr and Einstein went on day and night, neither man conceding defeat. Momentum slowed. Herein is the basis for the title.
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Einstein was there at the 1927 conference of physics. So was Bohr and many other famous scientists. Said Einstein, “Quantum mechanics is certainly imposing. But an inner voice tells me that it is not yet the real thing. The theory says a lot, but does not really bring us closer to the secret of the ‘Old One.’ I, at any rate, am convinced that He is not playing at dice.”
However, by the mid 1930s, Einstein accepted quantum mechanics as a consistent theory for understanding behavior of atoms. He recognized that it was “the most successful physical theory of our time.” However, Einstein could not accept quantum mechanics as a completed theory since its mathematics did not describe individual events. He hoped his own general theory of relativity would benefit by his investigations of quantum mechanics.
The search for a unified theory would occupy much of the rest of his life. However, the unified theory still eludes scientist to this day. Yet, much has been our benefit as the science of the early 1900s is still generating stimulating interests, technology and scientific milestones.
Check back frequently. I love learning with you.
I hope everyone is enjoying my series on Einstein and its side tracks with me. Its been a great review for me and actually, its been helpful for some school children as well. Links to the other articles and a couple of side tacks are listed below.
What is the most astounding scientific
fact about the Universe — of all time?
video transcript:
“The most astounding fact… the most astounding fact is the knowledge; that the atoms comprise life on earth; the atoms that make up the human body, are traceable to the crucibles, that cooked light elements into heavy elements in their core, under extreme temperatures and pressures.
These stars, the high mass ones among them, went unstable in their later years. They collapsed and then exploded, scattering their enriched guts, across the galaxy.
Guts made of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and all the fundamental ingredients of life itself. These ingredients become part of gas clouds, that condense, collapse, form the next generation of solar systems – stars with orbiting planets and those planets now have ingredients for life itself.
So that when I look up at the night sky, and I know that yes, we are part of this universe, we are in this universe, but perhaps more important than both of those facts is that the universe is in us.
When I reflect on that fact, I look up – many people feel small, because they’re small and the universe is big, but I feel big; because my atoms, came from those stars.
There is a level of connectivity.
That’s really what you want in life, you want to feel connected, you want to feel relevant. You want to feel like your a participant in the goings on of activities and events around you. That’s precisely what we are, just by being alive.”
~ Neil DeGrasse Tyson
I just love what Tyson said in answer to this question.
Nov. 1, 2013 — In a major new survey of the early universe conducted from the NASA’sHubble Space Telescope, University of Massachusetts Amherst astronomer Mauro Giavalisco and colleagues at several other institutions identify the most distant, thus the earliest galaxy ever detected.
The surprise finding of a young galaxy from a survey that was not designed to find such bright early galaxies suggests that the infant universe may harbor a larger number of intense star-forming galaxies than astronomers believed possible.
This study moves science closer to answering a long-standing mystery about how cosmic re-ionization proceeds. If the theory of the Big Bang is correct, we must see the recombination of the ionized plasma into a neutral gas, or re-ionization.”
Yes, says Joel Mobley, a physicist at the University of Mississippi in the US. In simulations, Mobley demonstrates that ultrasound pulses could move at “superluminal” speeds (at the speed of light or exceeding that) when transmitted through water that contains thousands of tiny plastic beads.
Mobley calculated that the “group velocity” of a pulse of high-frequency sound waves could be increased by five orders of magnitude by sending it through a small chamber that contains about 8 milliliters of water and some 400,000 tiny plastic spheres. This means that the group velocity would exceed the speed of light in a vacuum. The spheres have diameters of about 0.1 mm and account for about 5% of the volume of the water-bead mixture.
The increase in speed is caused by dispersion — the phenomenon that causes different wavelengths to move at different phase velocities. When the pulse enters the mixture it experiences severe dispersion, which causes the different wavelengths to travel at very different speeds. This changes the shape of the pulse and can result in the pulse itself moving faster than the speed of light. However, the dispersion also significantly reduces the intensity of the pulses.
In a physics report posted at http://phys.org/news88249076.html, William Robertson’s team from Middle Tennessee State University also showed that the group velocity of sound waves can become infinite, and even negative. However, “no wave energy exceeded the speed of light,” said Robertson. Essentially, the pulse that made it through the filter at faster than light was an exact (but smaller) replica of the input pulse.
Gravity and space-time travel remember is what general relativity defines of most interest to Einstein’s statements about the speed of light. Is it possible that something may exceed the speed of light? Well, I’m not going to answer that yet. However, for now, I’ll say as far as I know, light speed is a cosmic speed limit. However, there may perhaps be methods in the works that will take normal space-time out of the experiment. Let’s keep thinking about this.
Program Description The Elegant Universe, “The Edge of Knowledge,” The central problem of modern physics: the incompatibility of Einstein’s theory of general relativity with quantum mechanics. He then lists the physical curiosities — properties of the motion of light, gravity, and the behavior of particles at the subatomic level — that have prevented physicists from establishing a single coherent theory for how the universe works. At the end of this section, Greene describes both the objectives and the promise of superstring theory, which attempts to merge the laws of general relativity with those of quantum mechanics. Superstring theory depicts particles that are one hundred billion-billion (a quintillion) times smaller than a single atomic nucleus — not as dots but as tiny strings of energy. They vibrate in different patterns, which in turn produce different particle properties. But because these strings are too tiny to locate with current scientific tools, superstring theory is not yet predictable or testable.
Program Description
In this interview Dr. Dean Radin talks with Merryn Jose about the topics of entanglement, psi phenomena in science, quantum physics and more! Dr. Radin is Laboratory Director at the Institute of Noetic Sciences in California. He worked at AT&T Bell Laboratories and GTE Laboratories on telecommunications systems, and for nearly two decades he has conducted research on psychic phenomena in academia and in three Silicon Valley think tanks. At Stanford Research Institute he served as a scientist on a highly classified program investigating psi phenomena for the U.S. government. He is the author of The Conscious Universe and Entangled Minds and has appeared in the movie What The Bleep Do We Know?!- Down The Rabbit Hole Extended Director’s Cut. (Merlian News)
I want to share this additional find with you:
Program Description Jill Price cannot forget anything in her life. This is a 20/20 investigative report about Jill and her condition known as hyperthymesia or highly superior autobiographical memory (HSAM). The gift of a perfect memory remains a scientific mystery.
As I’ve declared on my front page, “In my opinion there is a beginning and an end, but there is uncertainty in between. Its this in between where we find that we have a great need for each other. In the end we are all again one and there nothing is impossible.”
How can information be correlated at a distance without energy transferred between the two points? Do microscopic entanglements “scale up” into our macroscopic world? Is Jill’s memory related to the investigations being discussed by Radin with Merryn Jose (first video)?
Come back often as I seek expert opinions and to figure out these and other mysteries. Would you like to explore a unique perspective about time and consciousness here (because this is pretty wild stuff)?
One important point to keep in mind regarding any functions of consciousness in the brain is that, even if consciousness serves no functional role whatsoever (as some say), science must explain what consciousness is and how it is part of the natural world.
Now, watch this:
Quantum touch and consciousness
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Quantum-Touch – The Power to Heal An overview of quantum touch with demonstrations of healing. This is a basic human skill that transforms lives. Youtube watch?v=54drpTNIZ38 video
Become a Quantum Activist (southweb.org): “If you want peace in the world, then be at peace with everyone in your life and everyone that you encounter – all of your family, coworkers, ex-spouses, even perceived enemies and people who have harmed you.”
Power of thought
We are perhaps consciously — and unconsciously creating reality…
by what we think. Youtube FeFuc-qFKoA
Thanks for visiting,
Eric
Related articles
Become a Quantum Activist (southweb.org): “If you want peace in the world, then be at peace with everyone in your life and everyone that you encounter – all of your family, coworkers, ex-spouses, even perceived enemies and people who have harmed you.”
How do thoughts occur?
Well, it turns out that no one exactly knows.However, there is evidence that thought originates from our source… not the brain… no, our energy source.
Watch these video clips and then, let’s talk about it.
Before you experience a conscious thought, there are unconscious brain processes at work behind the scenes that must generate the thought. We know this, but we do not yet have a solid idea regarding what it is about brain function that gives rise to a thought.
One important point to keep in mind regarding any functions of consciousness in the brain is that, even if consciousness serves no functional role whatsoever (as some say), science must explain what consciousness is and how it is part of the natural world.
There is a reason that science can’t pronounce Schrodinger’s Cat dead or alive!Here is why: so, just for fun, think about it!Well, when the box is opened, if you look at the cat, a decision is final… only then is the cat found to be dead or alive. Otherwise, the quantum cat is either or neither… or, as was further suggested, the cat is both dead and alive. Now, this is STRANGE; to say the least. In another few installments, I want take this to some extremes. If you stick around, this cat puzzle will be only the tip of the huge unknown that is becoming known because of this very experiment. This strange thought experiment led to amazing discoveries about the properties of light, quarks, bosons, a time-space fabric, and lots more. Einstein probably can’t rest… its that exciting… so exciting that even grade school kids love learning about physics. This experiment led also to exploring the nature of consciousness and that is what I most want to explore.Strange but possibly true: