The universe - smooth or chunky? (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, November 06, 2015, 13:41 (3088 days ago)

A very long article by Corey S. Powell in The Guardian a couple of days ago summarizes the current battle between two separate approaches to the mystery of why things are as they are: it's relativity versus quantum mechanics: “Relativity gives nonsensical answers when you try to scale it down to quantum size...Likewise, quantum mechanics runs into serious trouble when you blow it up to cosmic dimensions.” Craig Hogan, a theoretical astrophysicist is the quantum champion, and Lee Smolin - a theoretical physicist to whom I think David has already introduced us - is fighting for relativity.-A couple of passages struck me as particularly relevant to the discussion with BBella:-QUOTE: “In Smolin's terms, quantum mechanics is merely “a theory of subsystems of the universe”. A more fruitful path forward, he suggests, is to consider the universe as a single enormous system [....] general relativity allows no place for an observer or external clock, because there is no “outside”. Instead, all of reality is described in terms of relationships between objects and between different regions of space. Even something as basic as inertia [...] can be thought of as connected to the gravitational field of every other particle in the universe.”-This seems very much in line with BBella's ALL THAT IS being a unified whole. However, Sean Carroll, an expert in cosmology, field theory and gravitational physics, tends to favour quantum mechanics, and points out that: “Einstein was optimistic that some deeper discoveries would uncover a classical, deterministic reality hiding beneath quantum mechanics, but no such order has yet been found. The demonstrated reality of spooky action at a distance argues that such order does not exist.” -Towards the end of the article, the author comments: “Even if Hogan [the quantum mechanics champion] is right, his space-chunks have to average out to the smooth reality we experience every day. Even if Smolin is wrong, there is an entire cosmos out there with unique properties that need to be explained - something that, for now at least, quantum mechanics alone cannot do.”
 
All Is Smooth, or All Is Chunky? Order or Disorder? Planned or Higgledy-Piggledy? I guess we'll just have keep watching that space....