Hawking: God not necessary

[sphenisc]

I think the modern idea is that a vacuum is actually a teeming mass of particles and anti-particles, spontaneously coming into existence and then annihilating each other. Energy is required to separate the matter from the anti-matter to keep it in existence for any significant length of time.

This suggests it only happens within hadrons.
I don't know if that implies the BB happened within a hadron in another universe, or that the two phenomena are not as related as previously thought.

 

[sol invictus]

Does he explain how the energy in the universe is created?

I haven't read the book.

But one of the theoretical developments Hawking is known for was finding a certain mathematical solution that might be interpreted as governing the creation of a universe from nothing (this interpretation is problematic for several good reasoms, but never mind). The universe that gets created is spatially closed; that is, at any given time it has finite volume and the topology of a 3-sphere (a "hypersphere").

It turns out that according to general relativity, the total energy of such a universe is always exactly zero. Crudely speaking the negative gravitational potential energy cancels the positive energy in matter and radiation.

Why? Well, remember that gravitational potential energy is always negative - or to be more precise, it's always monotonically decreasing as you move in from infinity - because gravity is attractive. But on a sphere (and think of the surface of the sphere, not its interior) there is no infinity. The farthest away you can get is the antipode. Work through the math, and you discover that this forces the energy to always sum up to zero.

It's very similar to the reason that the net charge on such a space must always be zero. The flux lines have no infinity to escape to.

 

[noreligion]

Apart from some rather dodgy free energy websites and articles, I've not seen any physicist claiming to show how something can be produced from nothing and persist without adding energy.

You have never seen a physicist speak about virtual particles? You must not have seen many physicists.

 

[kbm99]

There are posters on this site who I know will always make me cringe, or groan. There are others who I know will always make me laugh, or smile at the very least. There are a small select few who will always make me abandon any given thread they seem active in, for the sake of my own blood pressure.

Then there are those who I know will always give me something to think about and teach me something.

Thank you, Sol Invictus, for falling into that last category.

I haven't read the book.

But one of the theoretical developments Hawking is known for was finding a certain mathematical solution that might be interpreted as governing the creation of a universe from nothing (this interpretation is problematic for several good reasoms, but never mind). The universe that gets created is spatially closed; that is, at any given time it has finite volume and the topology of a 3-sphere (a "hypersphere").

It turns out that according to general relativity, the total energy of such a universe is always exactly zero. Crudely speaking the negative gravitational potential energy cancels the positive energy in matter and radiation.

Why? Well, remember that gravitational potential energy is always negative - or to be more precise, it's always monotonically decreasing as you move in from infinity - because gravity is attractive. But on a sphere (and think of the surface of the sphere, not its interior) there is no infinity. The farthest away you can get is the antipode. Work through the math, and you discover that this forces the energy to always sum up to zero.

It's very similar to the reason that the net charge on such a space must always be zero. The flux lines have no infinity to escape to.

 

[Seismosaurus]

Isn't the total energy content of the universe zero?

 

[DC]

Isn't the total energy content of the universe zero?

as we only know about 6% of the universe, how would we know?

 

[plumjam]

Isn't the total energy content of the universe zero?

Only on Monday mornings.

 

[shadron]

erm i did, a video from the cassiopeia project

At the danger of loosing, once again, my immortal hard physics soul to Sol, perhaps you actually meant this Cassiopeia video:

...at least 10⁸⁵ grams. This is a huge number, enough to account for all the matter and energy that exists today. But notice that the total energy in the universe is within a quantum fluctuation of equaling zero.

 

[Towlie]

Isaac Asimov wrote "God is not needed" in an article once, and I remember thinking back then that it was an unfortunate choice of words. Of course what was really meant by both Asimov and Hawking is that the concept of God is not needed in order to explain things ("Je n'avais pas besoin de cette hypothese-la") but this shorthand way of saying it is just too short. It prompts the simple-minded to say something like "God doesn't need you either" and then dismiss the issue with an air of smug satisfaction.

 

[DC]

At the danger of loosing, once again, my immortal hard physics soul to Sol, perhaps you actually meant this Cassiopeia video:

no, in my video they say at 2:15 :

"on this scale, the tiny bit of energy that is needed for the existence, can be created out of nothing."

 

[Michael Mozina]

Not sure if this should be in R&P, but I think it falls under science.

Hawking: “Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing."

Huh? Ignoring the God controversy, this particular claim is a non sequitur and it violates the conservation of energy laws. And no, the net sum total energy of universe is not "zero" or we wouldn't be here discussing his claim. Sadly this isn't the first time he's been mistaken. The universe didn't just go "poof" out of nothing.

 

[Perpetual Student]

The main problem of explaining away the existence or creation of the universe through the fiction of a god is that one must then ask, "how and why was that god created"? Did it come from an even bigger bang? Quantum fluctuations? You're just back where you started and -- of course, there is zero scientific evidence for such a god.
If one can accept the concept of an immortal god, then one can just as easily accept the concept of an immortal universe (in one form or another).

 

[Wolverine]

This is a slight shifting from his position in A Brief History of Time, where he did not dismiss the possibility of God being involved.

Several media outlets have billed it as such (example), but that's not the case. The problem: noteworthy scientists such as Hawking and Einstein have had a peculiar habit of using the term "God" metaphorically to describe nature -- or, to borrow Weinberg's phrasing, "an abstract principle of order and harmony" that can be expressed mathematically. Specifically, Hawking's "know the mind of God" phrase in A Brief History of Time is a reference to a theory of everything. Journalists apparently still have as much difficulty recognizing this as any casual reader, perhaps more so on slow news days.

If only I were a believer, I could offer sincere prayers for vastly better science journalism.

 

[nathan]

I listened to a report on BBC radio 4 this morning about this article and his book which did not state that he explains where the energy in the universe came from. I've just read the Telegraph supplement article and haven't seen an answer to my question in there either. I was wondering if someone here knew more about the theoretical content of Hawking's soon to be published book than I do and whether there is a good answer to the question I asked in my previous post.

Alas, all I've got so far is an arsey American.

You are presuming the total energy is non-zero.

ETA: hehe, I searched for one of Sol's posts about energy as he's explained it more than once, and I see he's already got here and done it for me

 

[zooterkin]

Specifically, Hawking's "know the mind of God" phrase in A Brief History of Time is a reference to a theory of everything. Journalists apparently still have as much difficulty recognizing this as any casual reader, perhaps more so on slow news days.

Yes, I heard that being quoted yesterday lunchtime on the radio, and I agree with you, they were misunderstanding what it meant. What I said in the OP was a paraphrase of what was in the quoted article.

On the other hand, I suspect the publicity department of the book publisher is behind a lot of the misrepresentation in order to make a bigger splash about the launch.

 

[Roboramma]

Huh? Ignoring the God controversy, this particular claim is a non sequitur and it violates the conservation of energy laws. And no, the net sum total energy of universe is not "zero" or we wouldn't be here discussing his claim.

Similarly I know the total momentum of system "X" is non-zero because I've observed one part of it moving...

 

[cienaños]

Someone I 'six-degrees' know read Hawking's comment

"God did not create the Universe"

and posted the following as their response:

But what, let alone whom begat the laws of physics in the first place?

they went on with a mouthful of idiocy. I have to respond and I will. But the stuff I have tends to be longer than a sentence. If anyone can provide perhaps a vowel, a grunt, something succinct, or bite-size even - I would be oh so grateful. Thanks!

 

[Puppycow]

Someone I 'six-degrees' know read Hawking's comment and posted the following as their response:

they went on with a mouthful of idiocy. I have to respond and I will. But the stuff I have tends to be longer than a sentence. If anyone can provide perhaps a vowel, a grunt, something succinct, or bite-size even - I would be oh so grateful. Thanks!

I'm with Dancing David on this:
It came from "We don't know."
Or as I once heard, from "something else."

Not a very satisfying answer, I know.

Maybe reading Hawkings' book in full will shed some light, but I doubt it. I think the gist of it will still be "We don't know." And maybe some speculation.

 

[cienaños]

I'm with Dancing David on this:
It came from "We don't know."
Or as I once heard, from "something else."

Not a very satisfying answer, I know.

Maybe reading Hawkings' book in full will shed some light, but I doubt it. I think the gist of it will still be "We don't know." And maybe some speculation.

Exactly. We don't know.

But doesn't the evidence suggest that "god" was and is a man-made mechanism meant to support structure, order, and fear-based control of the human species?

As I understand it, the two ideas exist separately:

Origin of existence? We don't know.

Origin of god? Man-made.

 

[Puppycow]

Exactly. We don't know.

But doesn't the evidence suggest that "god" was and is a man-made mechanism meant to support structure, order, and fear-based control of the human species?

As I understand it, the two ideas exist separately:

Origin of existence? We don't know.

Origin of god? Man-made.

Yes. Exactly.

I don't just call the "something else" "god" because I don't want to conflate it with any mythological gods.