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Between the lines: multiverse special

19 May 2011

A trio of books about the idea of the multiverse

Many worlds

Multiverses on parade

A universe with infinite spatial extent will contain infinitely many mini-universes. An infinite number of these mini-universes will be exactly like our own. Welcome to the mind-blowing nature of infinity – and the sometimes equally mind-blowing nature of the multiverse, which is a common theme among the books in this month’s column. First up is Brian Greene’s The Hidden Reality, which explores nine variations on the multiverse theme. Of these, the type of multiverse that arises as a consequence of infinite space – Greene calls it the “quilted multiverse” because regions of space will repeat like patterns in a quilt – is actually one of the easiest to comprehend. From then on, things get both more complicated and more interesting, as Greene leads the reader through cosmic inflation, string theory and the “many worlds” interpretation of quantum mechanics. Greene’s tour of multiverses also takes in some even more exotic territory, as he considers the possibility that our distant descendents could one day create simulated universes – or that we are living in one such simulation (as in the film The Matrix). All of this is, of course, extremely speculative, and large swathes of it seem fated to remain that way forever. Yet those who believe – not unreasonably – that multiverse theories have more in common with religion or philosophy than they do with science should still give Greene’s book a chance. The chapter on “Science and the multiverse”, in particular, explores the many criticisms of multiverse theories in a sensitive and thoughtful way. Sceptical readers will find they can appreciate Greene’s logic and candour, even if they ultimately decide to disagree with him.

  • 2011 Allen Lane/Knopf £25.00/$29.95hb 384pp

Click here for physicsworld.com‘s interview with Brian Greene

Many universes, many quotations

In contrast to Greene’s book, which focuses on the most up-to-date views on multiverse theories, John Barrow’s The Book of Universes takes a more historical approach. By beginning with the universe according to Aristotle and other Greek philosophers, and continuing through Copernicus, Kant and Laplace into the modern era, Barrow makes an important point: our concept of the universe has expanded tremendously over the years, so it is unsurprising that scientists are now seeking to extend it still further. The downside of this leisurely tour, however, is that the book takes an awfully long time to get going. After 100 pages, we have only just reached Einstein and the 20th century. The pace does pick up later in the book, with a good chapter on “post-modern universes” that covers, among other things, Barrow’s own research on the possibility that the speed of light was not constant in the early universe. However, even here the narrative is repeatedly interrupted, because either the author or his publisher thought it was a good idea to chuck in at least one quotation every six paragraphs or so. We do not normally discourage witty comments from scientists, but The Book of Universes contains so many that they actually get in the way. Worse, for every quote that reveals a deeper truth – such as Chaim Weizmann’s comment that “Einstein explained his theory to me every day and on my arrival I was fully convinced that he understood it” – there seem to be at least two that have made it into the book simply because they are vaguely amusing. Whoever was responsible for filling the book with them should have heeded the words of crime novelist Dorothy L Sayers, who once wrote that “A facility for quotation covers the absence of original thought.”

  • 2011 Bodley Head £20.00 368pp

A sceptical overview

A little over a century ago, some British mathematicians and physicists thought they had uncovered the theory of everything. According to their theory, the fundamental particles of nature were actually composed of different types of vortices, swirling in a perfect, frictionless fluid. This theory was beautiful, elegant and coherent. As late as 1903, the American physicist Albert Michelson declared that it “ought to be true, even if it is not”. Vortex theory could also explain – in a way that traditional theories of solid atoms could not – the existence of lines in the spectra of chemical elements: clearly, the lines represented different modes of vibration in the vortex atom. Of course, no-one now believes in vortex atoms, but as Helge Kragh explains in Higher Speculations: Grand Theories and Failed Revolutions in Physics and Cosmology, the rise and fall of vortex theory makes a useful cautionary tale for modern theory-of-everything enthusiasts. Kragh, a historian of science, is interested in how such explanations arose, why they failed and whether any parallels can be drawn with modern theories – including those that incorporate some version of a multiverse. Much of the book’s second half is devoted to teasing out the links between theories of the multiverse, string theory and the anthropic principle; Kragh defines the latter as “an attempt to deduce non-trivial consequences about nature from the consideration that what we observe must be compatible with our existence”. These three concepts have quite separate historical origins, Kragh observes, yet since the mid-1980s some elements of them have merged. His scholarly book offers a sceptical but largely impartial overview of the multiverse and related speculation.

  • 2011 Oxford University Press £35.00/$63.00hb 408pp

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