Universe from Nothing: A Book Review

[drphysica]

Has ayone read this red this book Universe from nothing? Is it any good? 8)

 

[Meselwulf]

Has ayone read this red this book Universe from nothing? Is it any good? 8)

I have read some of it, but personally I don't agree something can come from nothing, personally I believe the statement itself is paradoxical. Instead I believe that to resolve this incongruity is that everything required to make a universe there must have been essential ingredients, just not as we know it within the framework of what we understand, or believe to understand the laws of physics as they stand today.

What might be a good read is the Hartle Hawking universe wave function, where the probability of a universe coming from nothing actually arises from some non-zero potential which existed before the very first instant of time, or a well-like buzzword is the first chronon.

 

[Meselwulf]

The nothingness in other words, must have been the ''everythingness''... but it was a good well-informed book in regards to your OP question.

 

[Zmunkz]

Are you referring to the Lawrence Krauss book? It was quite good. If you aren't sure, you can find nearly the whole thing on YouTube... The book was originally a lecture he used to give.

Nothingness in this case means just quantum mechanics and an inflaton field.

 

[Meselwulf]

Are you referring to the Lawrence Krauss book? It was quite good. If you aren't sure, you can find nearly the whole thing on YouTube... The book was originally a lecture he used to give.

Nothingness in this case means just quantum mechanics and an inflaton field.

Actually, something from nothingness means that our universe appeared from nothing. There are some pre-existing models which says our universe has been here for a very long time, such as Ekpyrotic theory and Penroses Cyclic universe model. Inflation is post big bang.

 

[Zmunkz]

Sorry I might have confused the issue by making that look like an assertion. All I meant was, in the Lawrence Krauss book to which I refferred, he defines the "nothing" as an Inflaton field (which does cause inflatIon post big bang) and the laws of QM. That's what i meant when i said in this case -- wasn't trying to put that forward as a definition

 

[Meselwulf]

Sorry I might have confused the issue by making that look like an assertion. All I meant was, in the Lawrence Krauss book to which I refferred, he defines the "nothing" as an Inflaton field (which does cause inflatIon post big bang) and the laws of QM. That's what i meant when i said in this case -- wasn't trying to put that forward as a definition

Well Krauss is wrong. Nothingness does not mean inflation. The inflationary phase is when the universe went under a very rapid expansion, which is hardly a definition of nothingness.

I'd wager you have picked him up wrong.

 

[Zmunkz]

You keep telling me what inflat-i-on is, and I am not disagreeing. But according to Krauss, inflationary expansion is the result of the energy stored in the inflat-on (no I) field, a field which is also able to quantum mechanically state transition and cause the spontaneous production of matter from "nothing", where nothing (as stated) refers only to the pre-existence of the inflaton field.

I can also refer you to Leonard Susskind's Cosmology Lecture Series (part 8) on Stanford University's YouTube channel, about 35 minutes in.

 

[Meselwulf]

Yes, the hypothetical Inflaton is a particle... hypothetically believed to make the universe undergo a rapid expasnion. However as I have explained, the Inflation period is post BB, I don't mean to sound condescending, but do you know what the word ''post'' means?

This OP is about how a universe came from nothing, particles are not the ''universe'' by definition. Particles are the fluctuations of the so-far, four known fields of quantum field theory. This means that the Big Bang occurred before any inflations where present in the universe, so no, this statement of yours cannot be true. Or Krauss, whoever we shall give the credit too.

 

[Zmunkz]

This could be an interesting discussion, I don't understand why you are trying to make it so hostile.

In your last post you are in one instance question begging, in one mistaken, and in another misunderstanding me.

The OP asked if anyone has read Universe from Nothing. I stated I had, and gave a small spoiler: in reality, there may be no such thing as true "nothing". Our discussion from that point on has been the merit of that supposition. To merely announce that a field is not nothing, and therefore I do not know my basic English vocabulary, is to presuppose your definition, and sidestep the responsibility explaining yourself.

Now, as you said, the field IS the particle, just as the particle is the field. You are not correct about their being just 4; in fact there are many, such as the electron field, the quark field, the neutrino field, and even the inflation field. That was not the point of my mentioning the inflaton. The point, as Leonard Susskind explains in the aforementioned video, is that the field could have existed in its own right prior to the BB. In other words, "nothing" might actually mean "just a scalar field".

I'll give my additional sources (which undoubtedly pale against you own hefty credentials) then I will yield the last word to you. I am withdrawing from this discussion.

Krauss on the nature of nothingness:
"Systems continue to move, if just momentarily, between all possible states, including states that would not be allowed if the system were being measured. These quantum fluctuation imply something essential about the quantum world: nothing always produces something"
Lawrence Krauss, "Universe from Nothing", chapter 10 (ebook pg 202)

Stenger on viable models of the origin of the universe that begin with a nothing-thats-not-exactly-nothing initial state:
"Hartle and Hawkins developed what they called the no boundary condition model because it did not assume the universe began at zero time. They originally pictured the wave function as coming in from infinity, bouncing off the barrier, and going back to infinity"
Victor Stenger, "the fallacy of fine-tuning", page 142

Greene on the way a pre-existing inflaton field can spontaneously cause a BB:
"the essential conclusion is that as an inflation-filled region rapidly grows, the inflaton extracts energy from the gravitational field's inexhaustible resources, resulting in the regions energy rapidly growing too. And because the inflation field supplies the energy that's converted into ordinary matter, inflationary cosmology -- unlike the big bang model -- does not need to posit the raw material for generating planets, stars, and galaxies."
Brian Greene, "the hidden reality", page 277

 

[Meselwulf]

''Greene on the way a pre-existing inflaton field can spontaneously cause a BB:
"the essential conclusion is that as an inflation-filled region rapidly grows, the inflaton extracts energy from the gravitational field's inexhaustible resources, resulting in the regions energy rapidly growing too. And because the inflation field supplies the energy that's converted into ordinary matter, inflationary cosmology -- unlike the big bang model -- does not need to posit the raw material for generating planets, stars, and galaxies."
Brian Greene, "the hidden reality", page 277''

How can there be a [pre-existing] inflaton field to the BB, when everything known to exist in the world existed at big bang, this is nonsensical.

 

[jackmell]

Instead I believe that to resolve this incongruity is that everything required to make a universe there must have been essential ingredients, just not as we know it within the framework of what we understand, or believe to understand the laws of physics as they stand today.

Everything to me points to that conclusion: the Big Bang itself is seen as a catastrophe, we see a multitude of phenomena in the Universe exhibiting critical-point (catastrophic) transitions from one qualitatively different state to another, and it resolves the "nothing paradox": the "nothing" it emerged from could be so qualitatively different than what we see in the Universe today, that it could absolutely qualify as "nothing" when "nothing" is defined to be "qualitatively different from something".

 

[friend]

It seems difficult to understand how the universe could have come from the fluctuations of some field in space when space itself is assumed to also have not existed at some point.

 

[Meselwulf]

Nothing existed before BB, to thnk they had is like having a grape, after you eat the last one.

 

[Meselwulf]

MWI is nonsense. It has no experimental varification, which is also synonymous to the reason why all of string theory relies on such a frivolous variation of string physics. Yet is so far from being a theory itself.

 

[Vanadium 50]

This could be an interesting discussion, I don't understand why you are trying to make it so hostile.

Good point.

Please treat all members with respect, even if you do not agree with them. If you feel that you have been attacked, and the moderators or mentors have not yet gotten around to doing something about it, please report it using the "Report" button. If you choose to post a response, address only the substantive content, constructively, and ignore any personal remarks.

It is better to walk away from a possible confontation and come back later with constructive arguments.

 

[Q490264]

I have the Kindle fire version (Mobi) and just started reading it a few days ago.