THE GOLDEN AGE OF EARTH By J. W. Reid Copyright 2002 PROLOGUE What if, in finally understanding the universe, natural philosophers were to find that the world's great religions have been right all along? Scientists tell us that from the beginning of the big bang the universe's energy has gone through a series of stages of evolution. First there was the initial expansion of the universe's energy in the form of electromagnetic waves from its unimaginably hot and dense point source. Almost immediately, however, even as most of the energy continued to expand and cool, a portion of it was converted into particles of matter, some of which further coalesced into atoms and molecules, stars and planets, and, eventually, here on earth at least, into single-celled living organisms. From these evolved multi-celled organisms of ever increasing complexity and organization until, finally, human beings appeared. We humans are, therefore, at the most fundamental level at least, composed of the same inanimate energy as everything else in the universe. However, because of the astonishing levels of complexity and organization possessed by humans, we can exhibit capabilities unknown to the rest of the universe's energy compounds. Two of these, which are almost exclusively the result of the evolution of the human brain to its present form, are what I'll call awareness and choice. By awareness I mean the ability to be aware of our own existence, the existence of the world around us, and the relationships that can exist between the two. By choice I mean that we humans have the ability to choose, within certain physical limits, our own behavior. Along with this ability to choose our own behavior, then, it is naturally incumbent upon us to always behave in our own best interests. Which is where awareness comes in. For the greater our awareness-scientific knowledge of the universe (natural philosophy) and whatever understanding of the universe which results from this (metaphysical philosophy)-the greater will be our wisdom (moral philosophy). But, if this is true, where does religion come into this picture? After all, many believe our religious beliefs are also about wisdom. When Moses came down from Mt. Sinai, for instance, did he not bring with him the wisdom of God's Ten Commandments? Are we to ignore these moral laws because they are based on faith alone and not the result of scientific knowledge and understanding of the physical world? To answer these questions let's return to the question posed at the beginning of this work, only let me now rephrase it in a more definitive way. What if the scientists and philosophers were to develop a theory of the universe so complete as to be able to state not only the physical laws and principles responsible for its evolution to its present physical state, and beyond, but also how and why it came to exist as well? And, even more specifically, what if, as a result of this new and universally comprehensive theory, and by that I mean strictly from the physical evidence supplied by this theory, they were able to determine that, as the world's great monotheistic religions all agree, there is a physical world beyond the world of our senses? And that there physically exists within each human being an immortal spirit, or life force, or soul, which, upon the death of the body is somehow released, enabling the immortal soul to take up residence in that world beyond? And further still, that each human being, in order to properly strengthen and otherwise condition the immortal soul for its new, extended, and far more important existence in that afterlife, need only live in peace and harmony and love with other human beings and the world around us? And, finally, that there does exist a Creator of such unimaginable power, resourcefulness, and wisdom as to be able to create our universe, and in particular human beings, specifically to provide these immortal souls? Clearly, if there is an afterlife for every human being, then the ultimate wisdom the human race has always searched for must include the means to achieve not just some measure of success in this life, but, first and foremost, access to the far more important afterlife which awaits us. This, then, or so it seems to me, has been the role of the world's great religions up to now. To provide that measure of God's wisdom, attained through faith alone, which enables humans to successfully achieve the afterlife until such time as natural, metaphysical, and moral philosophers can provide that same wisdom-the wisdom of God-from a thorough knowledge and understanding of God's universe. Which brings us to the following dialogue. There I will as best I can provide a very limited and summary outline of such a theory. A theory which I am convinced natural and metaphysical philosophers will begin developing in perhaps the next few generations. Certainly within this 21st century. I say this because, as I explain in the following work, they are actually very close to this theory now. They just don't know it yet. How do I know the theory I'm proposing is The Right Theory? Or some version of it? Well, of course, I don't know for certain. After all, much of it is based on personal speculation. However, if you will look at the following pages 6 and 7, there you will find listed many of the major scientific, philosophical, and theological questions we must be able to answer if we are to know the complete truth about the universe-where it came from, how and why it and we came to exist, and so on. And we must be able to answer them in a way such that they all fit together into a seamlessly understandable universe. As you scan these lists, and then read the following dialogue, should you choose to do so, keep in mind that the entire world community of scientists and philosophers cannot answer even some of these questions in a way such that they all come together and make good sense. The theory presented here, on the other hand, even in its largely unsubstantiated and incomplete current state, can do just that. As to the general tone of this work, Albert Einstein used to say that we cannot expect to solve major problems with the same thinking we used in creating them. It is with such a mind-set, then, that I will be speaking of already familiar scientific, philosophical, and theological issues in ways which are to some degree unfamiliar to scientists, philosophers, and theologians. I do not mean to imply that this alone somehow guarantees the truth of this work. Only that you should not necessarily discount this theory simply because it requires you to think differently about the world. With specific regard to the scientific content of this work, I'll be explaining what I believe to be the true nature of such scientific concepts as electromagnetic waves, quantum and Newtonian mechanics, time, gravity, relativity, equilibrium, entropy, and Darwinian natural selection, but in a new way such that these all fit together logically and reasonably. Therefore some prior, very basic knowledge of these issues is almost a requirement if readers are to properly judge for themselves the truth of this theory. Thus the first three parts of the following dialogue are directed primarily at members of the scientific community. And especially for its younger members, since their scientific beliefs about the world are not as likely to be so permanently welded in place. However, the presentation is of such a general nature, with no mathematics involved whatsoever, and because, if generally true, it will eventually be found to have great meaning for most of us, I think those with only a passing interest in science might find some parts of it informative. For those not previously inclined to think of science at all as a worthy field of study, but who might still be curious of the consequences of such a theory, I would suggest skipping parts I, II, and III altogether, and begin on page 51 with part IV. In part IV I summarize the evolution of the physical universe, the main particulars of which were discussed in the first three parts. Part V then goes on to describe the relationship between science and religion which clearly results, as I see it anyway, from this theory. With specific regard to the theological content of this work, and because of the sometimes incendiary nature of the relationship some think of as currently existing between science and religion, I feel compelled to repeat here a statement which appears near the end of the dialogue. That when I speak of the world's great religions, and the beliefs espoused by them, I tend to separate these beliefs into two general categories. Those beliefs which are specific to a particular religion, or to particular groups within a religion, are not of issue here. What this work is concerned with are those most fundamental beliefs which I've already talked about, upon which all the world's great monotheistic religions are based. Certainly, these core beliefs are not always phrased as they are here, but in general I think most of us can agree their case is fairly stated, at least in principle. This theory, then, is not concerned with those beliefs separating one religion from another, but those which bring them together. Regarding the title of this work, ever since I began putting down my thoughts on equilibrium and so forth back in the late '70s, I have always ended up being dissatisfied with whatever title came to mind. This was mostly because I didn't know what I was doing. For as long as I can remember I've had a very strong sense that there was something important we humans were supposed to do. That there was some higher purpose to our existence. For most people religious beliefs fill that void. For me, however, even though I was born into a Christian household, I decided early on there was no God and no life after death for basically the same reasons that others have come to feel that way. Primarily, the abundance of evil in the world and the lack of hard scientific evidence of an afterlife. So, for me this sense of a deeper meaning to life went unresolved. Then, in 1963, at the end of my freshman year in electrical engineering at Arizona State University, I became determined to begin spending some private time studying the most fundamental of our physical laws hoping to find some clue as to how human beings could come to exist here on earth. For often the how and why of things go together. At first I gave little thought to reaching some overall understanding of the entire universe. As I said, all I wanted to do was figure out how we came to be here. As it turned out, however, the unsuccessful transition scientists had for so long been trying to make from the second law of thermodynamics as the driving force behind the evolution of inanimate energy to Darwin's principle of natural selection as the driving force behind the evolution of living organisms turned out to be the perfect place to begin my search. Because of the work of the physicist Ilya Prigogine and others, after many years I began to think of energy's constant search for ever more stable states of equilibrium as perhaps the ultimate driving force of the entire universe. With the second law and Darwin's natural selection as secondary consequences, rather than the primary causes, of evolution. Eventually, in the spring of '99, after decades during which scientific laws and principles tumbled endlessly over and over in my mind, I came to realize that there had to be some fundamental property of energy responsible for this constant search by energy for equilibrium. Which eventually led to the view of the universe discussed in the following dialogue, followed in turn by a complete reversal of my earlier beliefs about God and our life after death. Returning to the issue of what to call this work, then, as a result of these mental wanderings, I at different times thought to call it "On the Reason for Us", or "In Search of an Understanding of the Universe", or "Conserved Equilibrium and the Order of Heaven and Earth", or more recently, "The Theory", "The Connection between Science and Religion", "How I Found God", and almost endless variations of all of these. Only in these last few days of May 2002, have I settled on the current title. Actually some of the last words of this work, it has to do not so much with the subject matter, but, because of the theory of the universe scholars are near to developing, with what I am certain future generations will come to think of us. So, then, because I've most likely laid quite a few new ideas on you already, even though this is still only the introduction, let me give you two thoughts to focus on should you choose to read the main body of this work. First, I am not trying to convince you that the particulars of the theory of the universe laid out here are necessarily correct, my ego notwithstanding. The stakes here are far too high for that. Rather, consider mostly the overall picture of the world such a theory will eventually give us. And second, while for centuries some have come to think one of the consequences of just such a complete scientific theory of the universe would be to deny the existence of a Creator and/or an afterlife, exactly the opposite will turn out to be true. Finally, while the particular explanation of the universe presented here is, as far as I know, largely unique, the ultimate result of it, that understanding the universe leads to the conclusion that there is a Creator of infinite power, wisdom, and mercy, and an afterlife for each of us of eternal perfection, is not. In his book, THE PHYSICS OF IMMORTALITY (1994), the physicist Frank J. Tipler employs a mathematical theory to prove the existence of a Creator and an afterlife. However, whereas I assume the universe is only part of a larger, older, parent reality, he assumes the universe to be all there is to reality. Also, while I am concerned with the universe from the beginning of universal time to the present, he basically deals with the universe from the present out to the end of time. And, while I see the afterlife as starting immediately after this one, he holds that as this life ends for each of us, our individual immortal souls are held in timeless, suspended animation until the final judgement day at the end of universal time. How all of these issues will ultimately shake out I do not know. However, Regarding the relationship between religion and science, THE PHYSICS OF IMMORTALITY is a terrific book carefully written by a really good writer. QUESTIONS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE WHICH MUST BE ANSWERED With Regard to Science * What about energy? * What is it and where does it come from? * How does it propagate through space? * Why does it travel at the speed of light? * What properties of energy cause it to always behave the way it does? * What about the horizon problem? * What about the smoothness problem? * What about the boundary problem? * What about time? What is it and where does it come from? * What about space? What is it and where does it come from? * Can the mechanics of the quantum be explained? * The electron cloud? * The double slit experiment? * The Copenhagen Convention? * Charge? * Can the mechanics of relativity be explained? * Special Relativity? * General Relativity? * Gravity? * Mass? * What about chaos? Can it be explained? * What about entropy? * What is it and where did it come from? * Why does it always increase except in the formation of living cells? * What drove energy and the big bang to its present state? * What are the mechanics of life? How did it come to exist here on earth? Fig. 4 With Regard to Philosophy How do we define these terms? * Truth * Right, wrong * Good, evil * Beauty * Justice * Best form of government With regard to religion * Was the universe created? Is there a reason for it or was it accidentally formed? * Is there a creator? * Is there a reason for humanity or was it accidentally formed? * Is there more to reality than our known universe? * Is there a life "after" this one? * What must we do to achieve it? Fig. 5 A PARTIAL TABLE OF CONTENTS A DIALOGUE ABOUT THE UNIVERSE PART I. AN OPENING DISCUSSION ABOUT THE USE OF HELICAL ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION AND EQUILIBRIUM VERSUS ENTROPY AS A MEANS OF EXPLAINING THE UNIVERSE. Pg. 11 Helical E wave propagation - Pg. 12 The origin and nature of particles - Pg. 15 Equilibrium vs. entropy - Pg. 16 Newton's laws of motion - Pg. 17 On the relationship between quantum - Pg. 19 and Newtonian mechanics, the origin of mass, kinetic energy, and momentum The universe as a process with initial conditions - Pg. 22 PART II. MORE ON THE ORIGIN AND NATURE OF THE PHYSICAL UNIVERSE. Pg.25 The introduction of two time dimensions - Pg. 25 Special relativity The power of mathematics - Pg. 27, 31 The properties of energy - Pg. 28 and the universal conscience General relativity - Pg. 32, 39 Questions which must be answered - Pg. 34 about the physical universe Fractional distillation of crude oil and the nerf ball, - Pg. 36 analogies for the universe's parent reality On the origin and nature of the Big Bang - Pg. 38 The blue-dye universe - another analogy - Pg. 39 The constant speed of light - Pg. 40 Some thoughts on the origin and nature of gravity - Pg. 41 Absolute truth and absolute wisdom, - Pg. 42 the horizon problem The boundary problem, the smoothness problem, - Pg. 43 the Higgs boson, the Higgs energy On the origin and nature of charge - Pg. 44 PART III. FROM INANIMATE ATOMS AND MOLECULES TO LIVING CELLS AND HUMAN BEINGS. Pg. 47 An earth far from equilibrium - Pg. 47 The first living cells and the role of reproduction The role of surface charge, complexity, - Pg. 49 and organization in the search for equilibrium Why entropy decreases in living cells - Pg. 50 From single-celled to multi-celled organisms PART IV. SUMMARIZING THE EVOLUTION OF THE PHYSICAL UNIVERSE. Pg. 51 PART V. ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SCIENCE AND RELIGION. Pg 54 EPILOGUE. Pg. 69 A DIALOGUE ABOUT THE UNIVERSE PART I AN OPENING DISCUSSION ABOUT THE USE OF HELICAL ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION AND EQUILIBRIUM VERSUS ENTROPY AS A MEANS OF EXPLAINING THE UNIVERSE. A 737-B has just reached cruising altitude for its trip from California to Colorado. In one row toward the back an older man in the middle seat leafs through the airline magazine. Through the window his wife watches the Sierras slide by beneath them. In the aisle seat a younger man opens a book and begins to read. "Pardon me", says the senior citizen, recognizing the sky blue cover, "Halliday and Resnick, right?". The other smiles and, closing the well-worn book to expose the front cover of "PHYSICS For Students of Science and Engineering, Part II", by Halliday and Resnick, replies: "Yes, I guess this one's been around for a long time. Were you an engineering student by any chance?" "As a matter of fact I was. Arizona State. Electrical Engineering. I'm retired now, though." "I'm a double E as well. University of Colorado." "Really! Our three children are all CU grads. So how come you're reading Halliday?" "Actually, I'm trying to figure out, one more time, just how electromagnetic waves physically propagate the way they do. As I'm sure you remember, we can mathematically model them traveling as sine waves, and predict accurately how they'll behave in just about all situations, but nobody's ever been able to fully explain how and why the physical process actually occurs as it does. What causes E waves to behave that way and so forth." Pleasantly surprised, the older man replies: "Hmmm. Yes, it's interesting you should say that. As a matter of fact, I've been meaning to take another look at E waves myself. I don't mean to say I've got them completely figured out as yet, but I do have some ideas that just might help us to better understand them." Even more surprised, the younger man says, politely, "Oh, really?". "Yes. I think so, anyway. Have you been able to make any progress?" "No, But there's got to be an explanation somehow, somewhere. If you've some new ideas I'd like to hear them." "Well, before I get to them let's make sure we're on the same page here. If you remember, at the very beginning of the book the authors talk about studying electromagnetic waves on two levels. The first level has to do with learning them well enough to solve practical engineering problems. Which is of course what the book's about. They do mention, however, that there remains a deeper understanding of the universe that no one's yet fathomed. One that connects electromagnetic theory and quantum theory and all the rest of the universe together into one seamless, completely understandable reality. It sounds to me like you want to know not only the mathematical how of E waves but the philosophical why as well." "Yeah, I know. I'm probably asking too much. And I ought to be satisfied like most people to just learn how to use the theory and let it go at that. My problem is that I'm doing some antenna design work right now and it keeps reminding me I don't really know what I'm doing. Or, I suppose I should say, we don't know what we're doing. And, while simple antenna design, which is all I'm doing, is mostly cookie cutter sort of stuff any more what with computer software and all, when something doesn't make complete sense to me I start to get uneasy about the whole situation. Because somewhere down the line I know I may be leaving myself open to making some big mistakes simply because I didn't understand what was going on well enough from the beginning. So, from time to time I'll whip out old Halliday and Resnick here, or sometimes check out some other source looking for maybe a slightly different explanation of E waves; hoping to find some deeper meaning to it all. Some fundamental reason why electric and magnetic waves work the way they do, that none of us understand yet. So, yeah, I guess I want to know not just the how, but the why." "I know exactly what you mean. I feel the same way. As do many others. I don't recall his exact words, but I remember reading somewhere about the physicist Richard Feynman commenting on the unfathomable strangeness of electromagnetic waves. So, if you don't mind, what I'd like to do is make a suggestion or two about an entirely different way to look at electromagnetic waves. Mind you, I'm no bona fide scholar on this subject, so I might just be whistling in the dark here. I only have an undergraduate degree, and, as a matter of fact, I didn't complete the requirements for that until I was 37. So, like I say, I certainly could not be categorized as a scholar. However, for reasons which are a bit complicated, some personal investigations I've been working on recently, sort of as a hobby you might say, on the origin and nature of time led me just last year to realize that maybe we haven't been able to figure out electric and magnetic waves because we keep thinking of them as sine waves interacting at right angles to each other. When, in reality, the two sine waves might just be two slices, so to speak, of a continuously advancing electromagnetic helix." "Hold on a minute! I've never heard that one before. I'm not sure I follow you." "Of course. That's understandable. After all, for generations we've been taught that electromagnetic waves travel as sine waves like you said. And the two dimensional mathematics has always worked perfectly for us in every respect. Thus there's never been any reason to think they propagate any other way. Except for one thing. We don't understand the cause and effect relationships-the mechanics, if you will-responsible for the propagation of these waves. So maybe, as you young people say nowadays, we need to get outside the box." "Outside the box?" "Yes. In this case the sine wave box. What I'm saying is, we might be thinking of electric and magnetic waves more or less exclusively in terms of constantly interacting sine waves when the whole electromagnetic wave front actually travels through space as a continuous, constantly rotating, three-dimensional helix." "Like I said, I never thought about it that way." "I know. I only stumbled on the idea because of, again, some other thinking I've been doing about quantum mechanics and time. And I'll say again that I don't know if there's any truth to this idea about the helix or not. It's going to take somebody better at math than myself to develop a mathematical model to prove it. But I think if it can be done, it might help us to have a clearer picture of E waves, and much more besides. That's why I think you might be interested. At least it'll give you something to think about. And, who knows, if you're better at the math than I am, maybe you can work it all out and surprise the heck out of everybody. Wait a minute, to show you what I mean (pointing to the folded sheet of notebook paper the young man is using as a bookmark) can we write on that? "Sure." "OK then. First, if you don't mind, draw me a simple sine wave traveling from left to right." The young man does so. (Fig. 1) "Like that?" "Good! Now, starting at the same place, superimpose on the sine wave a helical wave also traveling from left to right that's at the same frequency and amplitude and also in phase with the sine wave you've already drawn. Only remember, you only have two dimensions to work with, because that's all you have with a sine wave. In other words, you want to try to reduce a three dimensional helix, or corkscrew shape, into a two dimensional figure." The young man, after several tries, begins to draw another sine wave on top of the first one. (Fig. 2) Fig. 1 Fig. 2 "I see what you mean. I get another sine wave. Actually, I get the same sine wave." "That's what I'm saying. Graphically, a three dimensional helix reduces to a two dimensional sine wave. And if you can do it graphically, you know you can do it mathematically. By the same token, we ought to be able to go the other way and mathematically expand a sine wave to a helix. Although, like I said, I don't know how to do it. My whole point here is that if the electromagnetic wave actually does travel helically in the real world, then it seems to me that would have a lot to do with why we can't fully explain the mechanics of it. We're basically trying to explain in two dimensions what really requires three dimensions to actually happen." "If you're right, that might have everything to do with it." "Maybe, maybe not. It depends on just how deep you want to go with your explanation. If the corkscrew idea works, and if you're satisfied with the mathematics of how electric and magnetic waves interact to produce an electromagnetic wave, then that's all you need. But if you truly want to know exactly why electric and magnetic waves interact the way the math says they do, if indeed it could show they travel as a helix, then what we've talked about so far isn't going deep enough. Then you have to start thinking of what Halliday and Resnick said about the deeper meaning of things." "Well, yeah, but we may never know where electromagnetic energy comes from and what it really is. Or why it shows up as electric and magnetic waves, let alone why they work the way they do. Which is what I suppose they were talking about." "Again, maybe, maybe not. However, that's actually the kind of stuff I'm working on now." "A minute ago you said something about working with time. And now you're talking about the origin and nature of electromagnetic waves. Just exactly what is it you're doing?" Smiling, the older man replies, "What's that old saying, be careful what you wish for? Actually, there's a long answer and a short answer to that. As far as the short answer goes, which is probably more along the lines of what you're most likely to be interested in here, I've recently been working on trying to understand the origin and nature of time. Where time comes from, what it really is, how it works, and so forth. You see, I think I can make the argument that our universal time, and by that I mean the time that clocks the evolution of our universe, originates in the quantum world. Actually, it turns out that, if we include some other considerations which I won't go into here, quantum particles, because of the way they work, and because they are the fundamental components of all matter, might turn out to be the original time generators for the matter which makes up our universe. Further, using these same ideas I can then go on to explain some of the mechanics of the quantum and some of the mechanics of relativity and gravity as well. And, eventually, perhaps, where all the laws of nature come from, and how all these things fit together into an overall theory of the universe. I'm not trying to say I've got everything all worked out yet. Far from it. But I've been able to make a lot of progress toward a general understanding of how the universe works, at least to the point where everything is starting to make sense. So I think I'm at least on the right track. But I can only do this if I first assume that the big bang begins with pure electromagnetic energy propagating outward in all directions from the original point source, and that it does this helically." "If you say so. But, frankly, sir, with all due respect, you've lost me completely." "I suppose I have. And that's completely my fault." (He pauses for a moment) "Look. Let me give you the short tour here just to give you a general idea of what I'm talking about. That is, if you're still interested." "Well, all right. I'm game." "Good! First of all, let's just assume for the sake of my argument here that the big bang does indeed begin with, as I said, electromagnetic radiation propagating helically outward from the initial point source at the speed of light. If I were to give you the long tour I could explain more of why I think it does this, but for now let's just assume for the sake of the argument here that it does and let it go at that. Let's then also assume, as most physicists currently do, that some sort of cataclysmic, symmetry-breaking event occurred such that the propagating electromagnetic waves, or some of them anyway, are torn up into bits and pieces. My guess is they either somehow interfered with each other since they were so bunched up at the beginning of the big bang, or maybe they ran into some sort of external high energy field as the physicist Higgs has already suggested. Anyway, let's then further assume that work is done on these bits and pieces of traveling waves, i.e. energy is transferred to them in such a way, that these quanta, as we call them, are somehow, in some way, twisted around and rolled up into a ball. The result of which is that instead of propagating through space at the speed of light like they were originally doing, they are caused to propagate in circles. Sort of like a dog chasing its tail. Only instead of just spinning in place in two dimensions, these standing waves are also precessing due, again, to the generally helical nature of wave propagation I've proposed. Thus the standing waves form perfect little spheres. Which we call particles. Because of the symmetry-breaking event, then, however it happens, and the helical nature of E waves, what we have now are two types of wave quanta. Those propagating helically through space at the speed of light-the original electromagnetic waves, and those spinning and precessing spherically in place, but also at the speed of light, which we call particles." "So what you're saying is that the particles which make up all the matter in the universe are really tiny spinning balls of electromagnetic radiation. That fits pretty well, then, with the current definition of matter as being energy at rest. You're saying particles are still E waves, they're just not going anywhere." "Basically, that's about it. However, these particles of wave energy exhibit different properties than they did when they were traveling waves." "You mean properties like mass and charge." "Correct." "But why? What makes them act so different? And how come particles have properties different from waves?" "Well, then, you've asked some big-time questions, haven't you? Physicists have been trying to figure out the mechanics of E waves and particles for almost a century now." "Are you saying that all they need to do is factor helical motion into waves and then they'll be able to explain quantum mechanics?" "No, no. Unfortunately, that's only part of it. It's true I think they will have to take helical propagation into consideration. And also that the symmetry breaking event actually transformed the traveling waves into standing waves. But there's a whole lot more to it than that. And one of the things you have to do is get into equilibrium considerations. You see, again without going into it here, all the energy in the universe, and that means all the matter as well, can be thought of as possessing a property which, from the very beginning of the big bang, has caused it to constantly search for ever more stable states of equilibrium. It is this property which drives all forms of energy and matter to behave the way they do. Actually, when you get right down to it, it's this property, plus one other property of energy, plus the idea that E waves propagate helically, which are responsible for the universe we see today. And once you assign these three initial conditions to the energy which existed at the beginning of the big bang, and then add in the symmetry-breaking event, then I'm pretty sure the evolution of our entire universe, which is really an enormous energy conversion process anyway, will become completely understandable." "Where does entropy fit into all this? I thought that all the energy and matter in the universe is driven to behave the way it does because it's trying to increase its entropy." "A common misconception. Actually, it turns out that equilibrium and entropy are closely related concepts. Equilibrium is generally defined as a state of energy or matter which, once achieved, results in no more further work, action, or change taking place. The more stable a state of equilibrium, then, the more work would be required to cause it to undergo change. Entropy, that is, the original definition of it, refers to energy's unavailability, or reluctance you might say, to do work." "To tell you the truth, I've never really understood entropy that well." "I know. I felt the same way for years. By itself the concept of entropy seems a bit obtuse. And so does the second law of thermodynamics, which states that the entropy of the universe's energy, as it moves from state to state, is constantly increasing. Also, if this is true, since the universe is composed entirely of energy, this means the entropy of the universe is always increasing as well. But if you instead assume that the universe's energy-and therefore the universe itself-is constantly moving toward ever more stable states of equilibrium, then you can see that more and more stable states of equilibrium translates into states of ever increasing entropy. The more stable the state of equilibrium, the greater the reluctance to undergo further change. The greater the reluctance to undergo further change, the greater the increase in entropy." "Yeah, but which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Does increasing equilibrium cause increasing entropy, or the other way around?" "Good question. And if you're looking only at the inanimate energy and matter of the universe, traveling waves, standing wave particles, individual atoms and molecules, and even stars and planets and so forth, which of course comprise most of the energy in the universe, then it might seem at first difficult to tell which is the cause and which is the consequence. However, the main distinction shows up readily in the development of living cells. The physicist Ilya Prigogine proved that the entropy of living cells decreases as they form, which automatically excludes the second law of thermodynamics as the driving force behind the growth of living cells. At least as the second law now stands. Thus, since living cells are themselves composed of energy and are part of the universe, we can no longer use the second law, which states that the entropy of the universe is not only always, but everywhere increasing, as the driving force, or what I like to call, the conscience, or at least part of the conscience, of the entire universe. But if you introduce equilibrium considerations in place of entropy considerations, then everything works great. In other words, I can make the argument, and I think it's a pretty good one, that all the energy and matter in the universe is constantly searching for ever more stable states of equilibrium-even the energy that goes into living cells-and that it's this search for equilibrium which is driving the evolution of the entire universe. Including the existence, and further evolution, of life here on earth. The bottom line here, then, is that the search for increasing equilibrium is the cause, you might say, of the universe's evolution, whereas increasing entropy is only one of the consequences. Like I said, though, to develop the rationale for all this would require giving you the long tour, which I sense from the look on your face you probably don't want to get into." "Maybe we don't have time for the long tour, as you put it. But, tell me, this idea about everything being in equilibrium. Does it have anything to do with Newton's third law of motion? I mean, Newton's third law says that all matter is in a state of either kinetic or static equilibrium, right? At least that's the way I was taught. Does what you're thinking about explain the third law? I'm asking this because, to tell you the truth, like the second law of thermodynamics, I've never really understood Newton's third law either. His first two laws don't say anything about equilibrium at all. But the third one does. To me it doesn't seem to belong with the other two. Maybe what you're talking about will explain it." "Well, again, yes and no. As you say, the way it's been taught to us in school the third law really doesn't belong with the other two. But that's only because Newton's original meaning of the three laws of motion was evidently lost early on. You see, I don't think Newton was thinking about equilibrium at all when he proposed the three laws of motion. He was attempting to introduce some new ideas about inertia, and mass, and momentum-which he called motion, by the way-and how mechanical forces cause changes in the motion of objects. It's these changes in motion-or momentum-which he clearly defines as actions. He did all this so he could basically spring on us his new ideas about the gravitational force. At least that's the way I see it. The first law says that because of an object's mass, and the inertia which arises from this mass, it will remain in whatever state of motion-or momentum-it's in until it is acted upon by an external unbalanced force. The second law states quite clearly, if you keep in mind Newton's very specific definitions of inertia, mass, motion, and action, that the magnitude of an action-which he defined as a change in motion or momentum-is equal to the magnitude of the unbalanced force acting on the object, and the direction of the action is in the direction of the force. The third law, then, goes on to state just as clearly, or so it seems to me, that actions, or, remember, changes in momentum, must be equal and opposite. Here he was introducing the idea of the conservation of momentum in a closed system, which, again, was absolutely essential to his explanation of the force of gravity he was also about to propose. You see, he had evidently recognized that all mechanical forces acting on objects do not directly cause changes in their velocities, as was commonly thought, and to some degree still is, but in their momentums. Applying this thinking to the movement of the earth, moon, and sun, and the rest of the solar system, he was able to rationalize that if there is a mutually attractive force acting on the members of the solar system, then, like other forces, it must also cause equal and opposite changes in momentum directly, and changes in velocity indirectly. As a matter of fact, the tale of the apple falling on his head, whether true or not, illustrates very well the idea that, because of the mutually attractive gravitational force acting on both the apple and the earth, as the apple fell to earth, the earth had to be at the same time falling toward the apple. Although, of course, much more slowly. Obviously, because it's so massive, no one before Newton had ever noticed, or even thought about, the entire earth moving up and down at all, for any reason. Let alone that such a movement could be caused by a small object like an apple simply because the apple was at the same time falling downward toward the earth. But Newton did. And he was able to figure out that while the rates at which the apple and the earth were accelerating toward each other were not the same, the actions, or changes in the motions of the apple and the earth were the same, and that they were equal and opposite. This allowed Newton to then say that his gravitational force, which he then went on introduce, was indeed a legitimate force since it also caused changes in momentum in a closed system which were equal and opposite. To put all this in a nutshell, then, I don't think the current interpretation of the third law is at all what Newton had in mind. However, that the scientific community has misinterpreted the third law as having something to do with equilibrium is neither entirely wrong, nor just a coincidence. For, if I'm right, since the entire universe is composed of energy, and all the various forms of this energy are constantly seeking ever more stable states of equilibrium, then all the laws in the universe which have something to say about these changes, like Newton's laws of motion, must have something to do with equilibrium. That's why, absent our understanding of the true nature of Newton's first two laws, and Newton's original definition of an action, which also got lost somewhere in the translation, it's only natural that scientists might conclude the third law was only about static and dynamic equilibrium. Because, in a way it is." "But Newton's laws of motion, and his law of gravity, have always been taught this way. Are you saying we've screwed up what Newton tried to tell us practically from day one?" "Royally." "But, how can that be? They work so well." "They do only as long as we are willing to assume, as was Newton, the existence of inertia and mass and gravity. But if you want to know where these came from, and the mechanics of how they work; and if you want to understand the connection between quantum and Newtonian mechanics, and a lot of other things as well, then Newtonian mechanics as we've been taught them can't cut it. And the first step to figuring out all these things is to get right what Newton was trying to tell us about momentum. Which, again, he called motion. Tell me. Did you ever read Newton's Principia?" "No, I never did." "Well, you really should. I haven't read all of it myself, but maybe you should read at least the beginning of it, especially where he defines very carefully all the terms he uses. That way you don't have to believe me if you don't want to. You can get it straight from Newton himself. "All right, I will. But I don't see how Newton's laws, whether they're about momentum or not, have anything to do with quantum mechanics. As you well know, nobody's ever made that connection." "Good point. If you'd like me to, I'll go ahead and explain the connection. At least, as best I know how at the present time. But you'll have to accept my explanation of Newton's laws for now. OK?" "No problem." "All right, then. First of all, remember that I was proposing we think of particles as standing waves. In other words, energy waves spinning and precessing in place at the speed of light to form tiny, three-dimensional balls of energy. So let's think for a minute about what it would take for one of them to begin moving. To do this, or so it seems to me, some portion of E wave energy would have to be introduced into the spinning energy wave to somehow unbalance the particle to cause its E wave, instead of spinning in place, to begin to sort of corkscrew its way through space in the direction the unbalancing energy would cause it to move." "So once again we've got helical motion entering into things. But what causes the particle spin to stay unbalanced like that? Wouldn't the unbalancing energy just sort of spread itself out into the rest of the wave?" "Yes, actually, it does. But you have to remember, the unbalancing energy only causes the spinning E wave to begin accelerating. You see, the original spinning E wave and this new unbalancing energy are at first not in equilibrium with each other. Now again I'd want to leave it to quantum theorists to explain exactly how it happens, but the end result will have the spinning E wave accelerating until the unbalancing energy is evenly distributed throughout the standing wave. At this time the two energies will be in equilibrium with each other. When this happens the entire particle, the spinning E wave plus the new energy, will have reached its terminal velocity and will stop accelerating. It will still be moving, and in the direction of the applied force, but it will no longer be accelerating." "Oh, I get it. By transferring energy to the standing wave, you're saying you're doing work on it to get it to move. In other words, its Newtonian mass, and inertia-its Newtonian reluctance to move-is due to the fact that it's a standing wave which won't move until some extra, unbalancing, wave energy is introduced." "That's pretty much the way of it. Remember, we sometimes equate energy to work that's been done. Here this extra energy, which in the Newtonian world we call kinetic energy, is what gets transferred to the particle when we do work on it. The added kinetic energy, then, is the work we did to make the particle move. Further, once it's moving, it's going to keep on moving in a straight line at the same speed until, say, it hits something. When this happens, it's going to lose some, or all, of this excess wave energy to whatever it hits. If all the excess wave energy is transferred out of the particle as it decelerates, the particle will stop moving and become stationary once again." "Hold it a minute. I just thought of something. You've been talking about what it takes to make an originally stationary particle move. Actually, because of the big bang, there are no stationary particles, right?" "That's true. Particles are not absolutely stationary relative to the center of the universe. But relative to all the other particles around them, they are stationary since they and all the nearby particles were born, if you will, with the same kinetic energy. All I'm doing here is ignoring this original kinetic energy to make things easier to explain." "I see. OK, then, if you're right about this idea about particles being standing waves, and about transferring extra wave energy to or from a particle, we now know why a standing wave can have inertia, or mass, and a traveling wave can't." "But that's not all. If you think about it, we can now explain the Newtonian concept of kinetic energy, and where it comes from. It's that extra wave energy we're saying is being transferred into and out of standing wave particles at the quantum level to change their velocities." "Yeah, but where does momentum come into this?" "Going back to the standing wave particle and how by transferring kinetic energy to it we can cause it to accelerate, it stands to reason that the more massive the particle, or the more massive the combination of particles, like an atom, the more kinetic energy, or, again in Newtonian terms, the more work, or force-applied-through-some-distance, will be required to achieve the same terminal velocity. And that's what we mean when we say that forces don't cause changes in velocity so much as they cause changes in momentum. Which, remember, Newton called an action. "I see. So Newton would have said that for the same action, the greater the mass the smaller the terminal velocity." "Couldn't have said it better myself. But there are two broader points to remember here as well. The first one has to do with Einstein's discovery while working on the theory of special relativity that adding kinetic energy to a system increases its mass. He said later that it was this discovery which led him straight to the idea that inert mass was simply latent energy of some kind. He also said this was the most important discovery to come out of special relativity. What we've just done, then, with our hypothesis that matter is composed of standing helical E waves, is provide the physical explanation, which no one has so far been able to do, first, as why particles of matter are still bits and pieces of electromagnetic waves, and, second, how and why, when we apply a Newtonian force to a Newtonian mass, we are actually adding energy to energy. In other words, mass no longer has to be thought of as latent energy of some kind. It is latent energy composed of helically propagating standing waves. The other broader point to be made here is that if we can accept the revised version of Newton's laws I've proposed here, plus the ideas about helical traveling waves and standing wave particles, then we finally have a very clear and reasonable explanation of the connection between quantum mechanics and Newtonian mechanics. Indeed, if you think about it, since the entire Newtonian universe is composed of standing waves of energy, surely all of Newtonian mechanics can be explained in terms of the interaction of helically propagating standing waves and traveling waves, and equilibrium considerations. " "Yeah, but that's a lot of ifs." "I know. And, to tell the truth, there's no way you should believe what I've been saying here. Actually, though, you really don't have to. In the first place, like I said, all you have to do is read the first part of Newton's Principia. That ought to confirm what I've been saying about Newton's laws. As to the rest of it, well, I think in, hopefully, a short time theoretical physicists are going to come around to this way of thinking about the big bang, and quantum mechanics, and so forth. And then I think you'll see I'm pretty much on the right track." "How do you know that? With all due respect sir, I don't know of anyone in the scientific community who thinks the way you do about these things. What can possibly make you think theoretical physicists, and mathematicians, and whoever else is working on trying to understand the universe, are going to come around to your way of thinking on this? Frankly, sir, how is it you can see these initial conditions, and equilibrium considerations, and things like that, and they can't." "Well, actually, what I did was sort of short-circuit the way things are supposed to be done. I guess the best way to explain what I mean is to compare our attempt to understand the universe to the assembly of a jigsaw puzzle, since both are accomplished with two distinct steps. With the jigsaw puzzle the first step is, as you know, to turn over all the pieces. The second step, then, is to assemble the pieces using the picture on the boxtop for a guide. With the universe, the first step, that is, in an ideal situation, would be to first uncover all the pieces of scientific knowledge we need to see the universe clearly. The next step would then be to assemble the pieces into a complete understanding of the universe. Of course, we have never had such an ideal situation. We don't have a boxtop with a picture of the universe on it, and we don't know when we've got all the pieces turned over because we don't even know how many important pieces of scientific knowledge there are. And that's led, through the years, to a lot confusion about what the universe really is, how it works, and so forth. And scholars are still in this mode. But there's a way around this problem. First of all, you have to realize that the universe is a process. After all, if you think about it, everything in the universe is, at the bottom line, a process. I know we tend to think of the universe as primarily being composed of physical things like planets, stars, rivers, rocks, people, furniture, things like that. But nothing that exists in today's universe was always thus. And nothing, not us, or the stars, or anything else, will always remain thus. So everything is actually a process. It's just that some processes proceed faster than others. That being the case, since the universe is entirely composed of processes, each of which serves to convert various forms of energy to other forms of energy, then the universe must itself be an enormous, by our standards anyway, energy conversion process. Now you, as an engineer, know there are certain truths which apply to all the processes in our universe. One of these is that they exist inside some larger, older reality, which, as I just explained, must itself be a process. Another is that to fully understand any process you have to not only know how it proceeds the way it does, but you have to be able to answer questions like how did it come to exist in the first place, and what's it doing? In other words, what part does it play in the larger scheme of things? That's if you really and truly want to understand it. And you also know that if you can identify all the initial conditions that exist at the beginning of a process, what materials are being used, their properties, the forces involved, and so forth, plus any boundary conditions, by that I mean how the process might interact with its environment as it proceeds, then you can accurately mathematically model, and thereby predict, the process from beginning to end. So we really need those initial conditions in order to understand the universe." "Yes, but as an engineer I also know that those initial conditions, the materials and so forth, have to be in place before the process can even begin. If the universe is a process, and I'm still going to have to think about that one for awhile, then how are we going to find out about these initial conditions if we don't know anything about this larger, older reality within which you say the universe has to exist?" "Remember what I just said about how scientific knowledge leads to understanding? Well, I sort of reversed the process. If the initial conditions can predict how the process evolves or unfolds, then if we know a lot about how the process is evolving or unfolding, can't we work backwards and figure out what initial conditions would cause this?" "I suppose so. But how do you know you're right?" "First of all, I don't know if I'm right at all. But I think I'm right for a couple of reasons. For one thing, I only had to come up with two properties of energy, which is the only material we have to work with, plus the idea of helical wave motion, plus one boundary condition, and, as near as I can tell, the universe would then evolve from its beginning as a point source of energy to its present state. Even better, it turns out that physicists have been close to these two properties with their first and second laws of thermodynamics. And, as for the boundary condition, by that I mean the symmetry-breaking event which converted E waves into particles, it's basically the same one that physicists say existed anyway. Since I only need such a minimal number of initial conditions, and these fit well with what physicists are already saying about the universe, and these do indeed allow the universe to evolve to its present state, at least as near as I can tell, then that's why I think I'm probably pretty close to being right with these initial conditions. Now as to when physicists are going to figure all this out for themselves, you have to keep in mind that they're aware of this situation and have themselves been working backwards toward these same initial conditions. Stephen Hawking and others have written about how theoretical physicists have been trying to take their mathematical models of the expanding universe back to the beginning of time to find out what caused the universe to begin the way it did. The problem is their models blow up back at the beginning of time because of singularities. Dividing by zero and so forth. That's where high energy particle accelerators come in. By physically recreating the super high energy conditions that existed at or near the beginning of the universe, they can learn more about the initial conditions that actually existed at the beginning of time." "Yes, but Hawking also said that they're not really concerned about any reality that might or might not have existed before the beginning of the universe. Which you're saying has to exist before the universe can even begin." "That's true. But only because they're not thinking about that yet. So all they're trying to do now is take their models back to time zero. However, I'm certain that once they get their super collider built they're going to get so much more information about particles their current theories and models can't account for that somebody's going to start realizing there's something fundamentally wrong with the way they're currently looking at the universe. And when they finally get to that point, somebody's going to recognize the real importance of the discovery of the big bang. That the universe is a process which exists within a larger, parent reality. And when that happens I'm sure it won't take them long to start thinking about helical wave propagation, and equilibrium considerations, and then they'll be off and running." "Well, sir, I hope you're right. And I thank you very much for telling me about all these things. It's been really interesting. But my head is spinning from what you've said so far, so if you don't mind, I'd like to get back to my reading, and also to think some on what you've talked about. Maybe I'll have some questions later on if it's all right with you." "Sure. No problem. That's what I meant, though, when I said be careful what you wish for. Because you're bound to get more than you bargain for when you give an old man a chance to talk about what he's spent half his life thinking about. But of course you had no way to know that. Actually, you're the first one I've ever talked to about this at such length. And I guess, now that I'm getting close to the end of this project, I was having too good a time talking about it to quit when I should have. So I apologize for laying so much on you." "Oh! No need to apologize, sir. No need at all." The young man once again opens his book and begins to read. The flight attendants are by this time making their way up the aisle with the beverage cart. The older man, thirsty now, lowers the tray from the back of the seat in front of him. And, even though his wife has her head on a pillow resting against the window with her eyes closed, he quietly lowers her tray as well, knowing she's awake and will most likely want at least something to drink. PART II MORE ON THE ORIGIN AND NATURE OF THE PHYSICAL UNIVERSE About 20 minutes have passed. Introductions have been made all around, and, with the lunch debris cleared away and the trays stowed in their upright positions, the lady is reading a novel, and her husband is thinking he might close his eyes and do some relaxation exercises when the young man begins to speak. "If you don't mind, I've got a couple of questions I'd like to ask you. I've been thinking of what you were saying about the helix. How it might allow us to understand how electromagnetic radiation travels. It reminded me of an article I once read about those two biologists, Watson and Crick, who couldn't figure out how the two strands of DNA could be connected the way they are until they twisted them into a double helix. Do you think this is maybe the same sort of deal with electromagnetic radiation? And could it be that maybe this idea of the helix is a lot more important to our understanding of the universe than we think?" "Good question. And yes, I think you're right. That is, of course, if E waves do indeed propagate helically, which we don't know yet is true or not. But if true, helical E waves and helical DNA is probably not a coincidence at all. Certainly, it's a real stretch to go from the most fundamental form of energy, electromagnetic waves, to DNA, which has got to be one of the more complex forms of energy in the universe. But they're both forms or compounds of energy, and if we end up incorporating helical wave theory into quantum mechanics in something like the way we've just talked about, well, since the behavior of all matter is based upon the principles of quantum mechanics, then it's probably not such a stretch after all. "That's what I was thinking. And another thing. I also remember reading somewhere about how mathematical models seem to indicate there might be another dimension of time sort of wrapped up inside the quantum. And that physicists can't really explain how such a thing could actually happen. Now if I heard you right, you were saying that every particle is a time generator. Or something like that. Could there be some connection between what their mathematical models seem to indicate and what you're saying?" "Absolutely! You see, the single dimension of time we know about, which I'll call Newtonian time, only clocks the movement of particles through Newtonian space. But, if you think about it, it's the movement of these particles, and of the atoms composed of them, which is responsible for all the changes that take place in all the matter in the universe. So everywhere you look in the realm of Newtonian mechanics you find these particles. Now, as I see it, since all particles are actually standing waves spinning at the same speed of light, they are all tiny clocks. Larger particles may take longer to complete a spin cycle, but because of the constant speed of light, they are all synchronized. And since everything in the universe is composed of these little clocks, then all the matter in the universe is going to act in lock-step, so to speak. In other words, our universe is a process within which constant change is going on everywhere. And at the most fundamental level, changes occur, and physical processes proceed, precisely because all the individual particles involved, whether they're in atoms or molecules or whatever, are caused to undergo some type of change of state. Usually this means simply rearranging themselves and their atoms, and so forth. Therefore, because of all these tiny quantum clocks, which, again, are in all matter, the Newtonian universe behaves in such a measured, and measurable, way. It only remains for us, then, to find some way to measure this passage of time for our own purposes. And we do this by using structures composed of these particles, structures which constantly repeat a single signature state of existence, but at a rate we can conveniently measure and record. Thus we use the earth, which spins once a day on its own axis, for a clock. Or the earth orbiting the sun once a year for a clock. Or, for shorter periods of time, a pendulum-type clock, or an atomic clock which, well, you get the idea. But, getting back to what we were saying, the rate of propagation of the internally spinning electromagnetic wave, which, again, occurs at the constant speed of light, has to be clocked by a separate dimension of time. And it is that dimension of time, I think, some theoretical physicists are talking about." "If particles do indeed work the way you're saying, I don't see why two dimensions of time are required at all. If particles are standing waves as you suggest, then the ticking of these tiny quantum clocks, as you call them, and therefore the time they keep, is actually a function of the speed of light at which a particle's standing wave spins. A complete spin cycle, then, which you're saying is a measure of Newtonian time, is simply a unit length of the particle's internal spin time. And since they're all, as you say, spinning at the same speed of light, we still have only one dimension of time. But two ways to measure it. Either by the speed of light itself, or by the time it takes for the energy wave to complete a spin cycle spinning at the speed of light." "You could say that as long as there is no overall movement of the particle-let's here call it an electron-in Newtonian space. For in that situation both ways will keep the same time. But think of what happens when the electron is moving. Here, let me draw what I mean. (He takes the piece of paper and draws a circle with a horizontal line through it, designating the two points where the line intersects the circle as A and B.) ( Fig. 3) Fig. 3 OK. Let's say the helically spinning particle is standing still. Notice here I've reduced the three-dimensional sphere of a particle to a two-dimensional circle to make things simpler, but the same explanation applies in three dimension as well. When it's standing still, it takes the wave energy-which, remember, is traveling at the speed of light-the same time to propagate from A to B as it does for the energy to propagate from B back to A. Right?" "Right." "This means that, as you suggested, the duration of the particle's spin is a good, baseline indicator of the passage of time because only the speed of light, which is a constant, is determining the length of a spin cycle. OK, then. But now let's say the particle is moving horizontally from left to right, or in the general direction of from A towards B. Now in this case the wave energy is going to take a little longer to get to B, because B is moving away from the wave front that just left A. Remember, as Einstein said, nothing can move any faster than the speed of light. So we can't add the overall speed of the particle to the speed of the light wave as it propagates from A to B. Thus, since the energy propagating from A to B takes a little longer to get to B, because B is moving in the same direction as the wave is propagating, then the total time it takes the standing wave to propagate through a complete spin cycle, from A to B and back to A again, will increase. And the Newtonian quantum clock, which ticks, so to speak, whenever a spin cycle is completed, slows down. Right?" "Wait a minute. You've forgotten about the rest of the spin cycle. When the wave energy propagates from B back to A. This is going to take less time since A is moving toward B. Won't this decrease in time cancel out the increase in time it takes the energy to get from A to B?" "No. Not completely. If the overall movement of the particle is much less than the speed of light, which is the case in Newtonian mechanics, then there's not much of an increase in the time it takes the wave energy to get to B. Because B hasn't moved very far. Or, going back in the other direction, there's not much of a decrease in time for the wave to get from B back to A. So, for all intents and purposes, the length of the spin cycle doesn't change. However, let's say the particle is moving really fast from left to right. So fast that it takes the wave energy, say, five times longer to get from A to B. In that situation it's only going to take the energy as it propagates from B back to A only about one fifth of the time it would take for it to get back to A if the particle were standing still. As you can see, these changes in the two times aren't equal. Decreasing the original spin time from B back to A by 80% is not nearly as large a change as increasing the spin time from A to B by 500%. And the faster the particle moves, the greater the disparity. And the greater the disparity, the slower the quantum clock ticks." "Oh, yeah, I get it! The faster the particle moves, then, the slower time passes for the particle. Say! Did we just explain special relativity here?" "At least, the most well-known case of how time slows for moving objects." "You know, it's like what we were talking about with E waves. I'm amazed at what Einstein and Hawking and other physicists have been able to do as far as mathematically modeling parts of the universe without actually understanding what's going on. Even more than that, they seem to be able to come up with models of parts of the universe we never even knew existed. I remember going to a lecture once about mathematics and the guy explained how powerful a language mathematics is. How other languages like English and Spanish use letters as symbols to model the fundamental sounds of the language, whereas the language of mathematics uses symbols to model entire fundamental scientific ideas. That's why, even though you can describe scientific principles and processes and so forth with other languages, you first have to string their symbols into words, and then their words into complete scientific thoughts. Which can take quite a bit of doing. Whereas with mathematics you simply combine maybe a relatively few symbols and you can mathematically model an extraordinarily complex scientific idea like E waves or relativity." "You're right, but there's a lot more to it than that." "Oh, sure. I know. You have to really know what you're doing. And you have to have a great imagination too. I still don't understand how Einstein knew to make the speed of light a constant so that relativity would come out the way it did. I mean, we still don't know why it is a constant. Only that it works." "Again you're right. But, like I said, there's more to it than even that." "What do you mean?" "Well, do you remember earlier when I talked about energy's search for equilibrium being part of the conscience of the universe?" "Yeah. And I was going to ask you about that. What did you mean?" "Well, without getting into it too much here, we define the human conscience as those ethical and moral ideas which together determine the way we think and act. At least, when we have free choice. Now as far as energy is concerned I'm not talking exactly about that kind of a conscience. Certainly not one that complicated. But think for a minute, what causes all the different kinds of inanimate energy and matter in the universe to behave the way they do?" "Well, I suppose the forces acting on them." "That's not exactly what I meant, although, yes, unbalanced forces have to be present before things can happen. But what I'm talking about is, given that some force is acting on some energy or matter, what causes that particular type or compound of energy or matter to react or respond to the force the way it does?" "Ahh, I see what you mean. Well, I suppose it's the properties of the energy or matter which determine how it behaves or responds to the forces acting on it. Right?" "Exactly. So what I'm saying is, from a purely physical universe point of view, you could say that each form or state or type of energy or matter in the universe has a set of properties which act as sort of a mechanical conscience for that particular type of energy. OK? Because they do determine its behavior. Now, having said that, I want to take this idea of a mechanical conscience one step farther. I'm just going to state right here, without taking the time to justify it, that at the very beginning of the universe, by that I mean at the beginning of the big bang, all the energy in the universe was of a single state or type, and that this energy possessed a single set of properties, one of which, as I stated earlier, causes energy to constantly seek the most stable state of equilibrium available to it. Further, I'm going to propose that just as all the states or types of energy which have ever come into existence since that time derive from that initial state of energy, so do all their different properties derive from that initial set of properties. In other words, while all these different properties of energy and matter we see around us do indeed cause the new types of energy and matter to behave in all sorts of different ways, it's only because the new properties are just different expressions of those initial properties. Are you with me so far?" "I think so." "OK. Moving along, then, I'm going to further state that this being the case, then everything in the universe, since it's made up of nothing but energy, has this fundamental conscience of the universe built into it. It's just that this conscience shows up later on in different ways. Am I still making good sense to you?" "Sure. But the thought comes to mind that if what you're saying is true, since we're made of energy and are part of the universe, wouldn't that conscience be inside us as well? Does this have something to do with that absolute, great-conscience-in-the-sky that philosophers have been looking for?" "Absolutely. They just don't know it yet. But we really don't have time to get into that here. So, then, getting back to this idea of a universal conscience, I want to make the point that all the energy in the universe has this conscience built into it, and it comes from those original properties that energy had at the beginning of the big bang. And, having said that, plus what I said earlier about initial conditions, I want to point out that physicists have been, for the past 150 years or so, very close to figuring out what this universal conscience is. By that I mean they've been sort of trying to force the first and second laws of thermodynamics into being this fundamental, universal conscience. But there are two problems with this they've got to get straightened out first, and then they'll be on the right track. First of all, like I said earlier, they're going to have to replace the idea of entropy increase with equilibrium increase as the driving force of the universe. I'm calling this one the second property since it matches up with the second law of thermodynamics. The first property, then, which the first law of thermodynamics already does a fairly good job of stating, is energy's quantity. In other words, I see no reason at all why we can't just assume that quantity is itself a property of energy. After all, a true property of energy would be one that's always conserved, and so is energy's quantity. As a matter of fact, that's precisely what the first law of thermodynamics says. So, until someone comes along with a better idea, will you buy that the first law doesn't actually cause the quantity of energy in the universe to remain constant. It's just a statement about one of the fundamental properties of energy?" "I suppose so. At least for now. But what about increasing equilibrium, which I assume is caused by the second property? Nothing's conserved there. So what conserved property is going to cause energy to constantly seek out more stable states of equilibrium?" "Well, I may be sounding like a broken record here, but, again, to answer this question completely we'd have to get into the really big picture of the universe. So let me just say, without going into any justification for it right now that the property of energy which causes it to always naturally select, if you will, for ever more stable states of equilibrium is its elasticity." "I don't get you. How in the world did you ever get the idea that elasticity is a property of energy? I can go along with you that quantity is one of the fundamental properties. But I've never ever heard or read anything about elasticity having anything to do with the evolution of the universe. I mean, yeah, a rubber band is elastic, or a baseball, but that's about all you ever hear about elasticity." "Yes, well, I'm not surprised. But, we can talk about it later if you want. And if we have time. Right now, though, I just want to make the point that there are two properties of energy. The first one is energy's quantity, which controls and governs the behavior of energy. The second one is energy's elasticity, which drives the universe's energy to react to forces the way it does in the first place. Therefore, remembering that the entire universe is composed of two types of helically propagating E waves-traveling waves and standing waves-it's these two properties which form the universal conscience that is everywhere in the universe, causing all the different types of energy and matter everywhere to behave the way they do. I see from the look on you face you're not totally thrilled with what I've been saying. So let me just quickly review what we've been talking about here. First of all, I said I was going to call the properties of any particular state or type of energy its mechanical conscience, since, after all, they do cause the energy to behave the way it does. And, that being the case, I could then go on to call the fundamental properties of energy that existed at the beginning of the universe the conscience of the entire universe, since they are ultimately responsible for the behavior of all the energy in the universe, and therefore the universe itself. Second, I proposed that there are two of these most fundamental properties, which I'm calling quantity and elasticity. Now I know, because they seem right now to be so new to you, these ideas are bound to be difficult for you to accept without some sort of evidence to support them. But, like I said, I don't really think we have time to get into it here. About all I can say is, by assigning these two properties to energy, along with the helical propagation of E waves as a third initial condition, I can explain most of the behavior of the universe from the beginning of the big bang right up to the present time. At least, what I know of the behavior of the universe. As further evidence, though, I would point out that the explanation of the universe that comes from these two properties, and the explanation of the behavior of the universe that physicists have attributed to the first and second laws of thermodynamics, are actually very close to each other. That's because, as I said earlier, these two properties have a great deal in common with the first and second laws. As a matter of fact, if you'll accept the idea I've proposed of replacing entropy increase with equilibrium increase, the first and second laws can be seen to derive precisely from these two properties, respectively, as long as we're just talking about inanimate forms of energy. Which is a pretty good thing in itself, since physicists have never been able to figure out up to now where the first and second laws of thermodynamics really come from. Now, if you'll remember, all of this discussion about fundamental properties, and the conscience of the universe, and the first and second laws of thermodynamics, and so forth, came about because we got off the subject of special relativity and on to the subject of why mathematics does such a beautiful job of modeling the physical universe. Right?" "Yeah, and, to tell you the truth, I'm kind of sorry I brought it up." "Actually, if I haven't bored you to death with the telling of it, what we've just talked about gives you considerable insight into what I think it's going to take for physicists to finally figure out the universe. So we really haven't wasted any time. However, be that as it may, let's get back to the subject of why mathematics is so powerful. Keeping in mind, then, what I've just said about the two fundamental properties of energy being the conscience of the universe, let me just say that mathematics is as powerful and illuminating as it is because it has already built into it, unlike all the other languages, part of the conscience of the universe. To explain what I mean, if you think about all the other languages like English and so forth, they are, one could say, transparent to the conscience of the user. By that I mean, assuming the language is sophisticated enough, and the user has sufficient command of it, the user can communicate any idea he or she desires. Properly used, then, the language has no impact on the idea. To put it another way, the language simply passes on the conscience of the user. However, that's not the case with mathematics. It has its own conscience. More specifically, one could say it has built into it the first law of thermodynamics." "How do you figure. So to speak." "Ha. What is the most fundamental law or principle of mathematics?" "I'm not sure. Right now I'm pretty confused." "OK. I understand. The most fundamental principle of mathematics is that 1+1=2, right?" "Yeah, I guess so." "Would you also agree with me that 1+1=2 is a mathematical model or analogy of the first law of thermodynamics?" "If you say so." "Let me put it this way. If energy didn't possess the property of quantity, which is always conserved, the universe wouldn't make any sense, would it? I mean, the universe would just take off in any and all directions, right? Let's say you're watching a baseball game and there's a runner on third. The batter lines a single to left. The left fielder runs over to field the ball, but on the first bounce he finds maybe twelve balls coming at him. And the runner, racing home from third, ends up being three runners crossing home plate. Or maybe the runner disappears and doesn't get there at all. Tough to keep score in a universe like that. Right? So you see, without the property of quantity the universe doesn't make sense. By the same token, because the language of mathematics has built into it this same conscience, that 1+1=2, as long as you keep to the other rules of mathematics when you're modeling some part of the universe, you ought to be able to predict a lot of things about the universe just from what your mathematical models tell you. Even things you can't measure or see. And that, to me, is what really makes the language of mathematics so much more powerful than all the other languages. The evolution of the universe has a governor built into it. Energy's quantity. Mathematics, the language scientists use to model the evolution of the universe, has this same governor built into it as well." "Like I said, I never thought about it that way. I guess now I'm sounding like a broken record, aren't I?" "Maybe a little, but that's to be expected here. But, having said all this about mathematics and the two properties of energy and so forth, and getting back to our discussion about time and special relativity, when a clump of matter is in motion, whether an individual standing wave particle or a complex array of such particles, as in the case of, say, an alarm clock, Newtonian time passes slower for the clock when it's moving than it would if the clock were not moving. Thus, you see, since the dimension of time clocking the internal speed of rotation of the standing wave has not changed, because the speed of light cannot change, there has to be two different and distinct dimensions of time at work here. The one we just talked about which clocks the internal speed of light, which never changes, and one clocking the external spin cycle of the particle, which does change when the particle is moving. Now this second one, Newtonian time, we're familiar with. It's the first one that mathematical physicists are not familiar with, but just might be seeing with their mathematical models." "But where does this other time dimension come from? And why is it the speed of light never changes?" "To answer those questions we have to start looking at the theory of general relativity, which is far more complicated than special relativity. And which I haven't got completely straightened out yet in my own mind. After all, with general relativity we're talking about explaining the origin and nature of not just Newtonian time, but Newtonian space as well, and the relation between the two, and gravity, and so forth. I think I've got some pretty good ideas trying to sort themselves out in my head, but I've got a ways to go yet." "Maybe so, but the way you're talking, it sounds to me like you think you're at least on the right track. So I'll ask you again, whether anyone will listen to you or not, what makes you think you're right?" "OK, OK. You're pretty persistent. The thing is, without getting into an explanation of the whole universe, how it works, what makes it work the way it does, and, most important of all, why it works the way it does, which it looks like we really don't have time to get into here, it's going to be difficult to answer that question. But, even though we're already starting our descent into Denver, I think there's time to at least leave you with some thoughts of what this theory I'm working on will do for us as far as answering some pretty important questions about the universe. First of all, (he reaches into his back pocket and, from his wallet, removes a folded sheet of paper (Fig. 4), and hands it to the young man) I like to carry this list around with me so I can remind myself what I'm doing here. From time to time I add to it or change it as I see fit. Which reminds me. I need to add the mechanics of magnetism to it. Which I still haven't figured out yet. Anyway, it's a list of questions that a good, sound theory of the universe should be able to answer. So let me ask you a question. Is there anyone in the scientific community who can answer these questions? Even most of them?" With regard to science * What about energy? * What is it and where does it come from? * How does it propagate through space? * Why does it travel at the speed of light? * What properties of energy cause it to always behave the way it does? * What about the horizon problem? * What about the smoothness problem? * What about the boundary problem? * What about time? What is it and where does it come from? * What about space? What is it and where does it come from? * Can the mechanics of the quantum be explained? * The electron cloud? * The double slit experiment? * The Copenhagen Convention? * Charge? * Can the mechanics of relativity be explained? * Special Relativity? * General Relativity? * Gravity? * Mass? * What about chaos? Can it be explained? * What about entropy? * What is it and where did it come from? * Why does it always increase except in the formation of living cells? * What drove energy and the big bang to its present state? * What are the mechanics of life? How did it come to exist here on earth? Fig. 4 (The young man takes a minute to look at the list.) "Well, actually, I don't think anybody can. At least I've never read of anyone who could. Of course, there's been a lot of talk about how we might answer some of them, a lot of partial theories and arguments and so forth that have been proposed, but I don't think there are very many answers to these particular questions floating around that everyone agrees with." "That being the case, then, with regard to your first question of whether I'm worried because the experts don't see the universe the way I do, let me point out there are no experts on the universe. There are experts on what we already know about the universe. Which is impressive in and of itself. But not on the overall, fundamental nature of the universe itself. If there were any experts, they'd be able to answer these questions. On the other hand, as I said earlier, the initial conditions I've come up with provide us with a theory of the universe, a world view if you will, which answers most of these questions, albeit currently in a very general and abbreviated way, and which is also consistent with what we already know about the universe. In other words, while I don't know all we know about the universe, what I do know about, Newton's laws of momentum and gravity, the laws of thermodynamics, and so forth, not only finally fit perfectly into this world view, they all finally make very good sense." "Of course that's good to know. Certainly the universe hasn't made a whole lot of sense so far. And, if what you say is true, or even mostly true, I'm impressed. But I still have this uneasy feeling that, if, as you seem to make it out, the universe is going to be relatively easy to understand, others more qualified from a scholastic point of view should've been able to come up with this world view earlier." "Well, as long as we don't get into the actual mathematical mechanics of it, which I don't know how to do, it is true that the universe is fairly easy to understand from this purely qualitative point of view I've been proposing. But there's more to it than just assigning the two fundamental properties of quantity and elasticity to energy, and saying that E waves travel helically through space. You see, you can't really understand what the universe is doing, and how it's doing it, until you can begin to think outside the universe. For instance, if you think about it, while the property of quantity seems to be almost naturally a property of energy, what about energy's elasticity? As you yourself asked, where does it come from? I mean, a rubber band has to be stretched first before its elasticity comes into play. In other words, we're talking about a two stage process here. The stretching of the rubber band is stage one. Its release and return to its original state of equilibrium-which is, remember, the state where no further action takes place-is stage two. So if it's energy's elasticity that's causing it to constantly try to return to some original or long-lost state of equilibrium, how did the energy that makes up our universe get deformed, and thereby loaded with potential energy, in the first place? To answer questions like this you really have to start thinking outside the universe. And before the universe began, as well. And, like I said, there's not a lot of that going on right now. Here, let me lay an analogy on you to illustrate what I mean about thinking outside the universe. Are you familiar with the energy conversion process which we call the fractional distillation of crude oil?" "I know a little about it, but I'm no expert on it." "Like everything else here, me neither. But let me give you a quick run-down on it so I can use it to make my point. As you probably know, the crude oil we take out of the ground is composed of a wide range of molecules, primarily composed of carbon atoms of different sizes and properties. The very largest and heaviest of these are like little ball bearings, and make great lubricants. The smallest, on the other hand, which are gasoline molecules, are highly volatile, and are extremely valuable in that respect. The problem is, when they're all mixed together, as they are in their natural state, the big ones can't lubricate very well, and the little ones can't burn very well. Obviously, then, they all need to be separated by size and volatility, and that's where the fractional distillation process comes in. This is accomplished by first constructing a large sealed container. A portion of crude oil is pumped into the bottom of the tank and is then heated to such a temperature that all the carbon-based molecules are vaporized, much as water molecules appear as steam over a pot of boiling water. All of the process so far, the collection of the crude oil, the building of the sealed container, the heating of the crude oil, and so forth, I'll refer to as stage one of the overall three stage refining process. In stage two the fractional distillation occurs. Here the idea is to lower the temperature of the vapor, but only just enough such that the largest and heaviest molecules can no longer remain vaporized. As a result they distill out of the vapor, falling back down to the bottom of the container. From these molecules, once they are removed and processed further, come various waxes and paraffins, shoe polish, axle grease, and so on. Meanwhile, the other molecules, being lighter, still remain vaporized. Lower the temperature a little more and out distills the next largest molecules. Being of a lighter, more liquid form, they are used for engine oils, machine oils, etc. From the next largest molecules, because they express a fairly high degree of volatility, come heating oils to heat homes and other buildings. And, from the remaining still smaller molecules come kerosene and, finally, gasoline. Of course, modern refining methods are far more complicated than this, but you get the general idea. Finally, keep in mind that there is a stage three to this process which has to do with how these various groups of molecules are used; for it is here that their ultimate purpose, and value, and the reason for the existence of the overall refining process, is determined. With all this in mind, then, let's make a wildly hypothetical assumption here that during stage two some of the gasoline molecules flying around inside the sealed container somehow, in some way, gain the ability to be aware of themselves and their surroundings. I know it's totally impossible, but work with me here for just a minute. And, further, let's say that, using telescopes and microscopes and so forth, they begin to observe and document the overall process of cooling and distillation going on around them. Unfortunately, since they have no way of knowing of the existence of anything beyond the inside surface of their container, and therefore can have no inkling of even the existence of stages one and three, there is no way they're ever going to make complete sense out of what's going on in stage two-their universe; which is, as far as they can ever know, all there is to reality. Thus they have no idea that their universe was created for a reason, or even consider at all how it might have been created. Or that the real value of the various molecules, including themselves, is related not to what goes on in their world, which is stage two, but to how they are used outside their world in stage three. That is, how they contribute to the parent reality after they distill out of the vapor. Indeed, because they never seem to be able to make any sense at all of their universe, some have even been heard to say that the only thing for certain in their world is distillation and taxes. All right, then. I think you can see my point here. I'm saying the universe is stage two of an enormous-by our standards anyway-two stage, or maybe even three stage, energy conversion process. And it's no wonder that natural philosophers have not been able to answer a single fundamental and important question about the universe. They can't possibly until they become aware of the existence of stages one, and possibly stage three, and how stage two relates to them." "But how are we to find out about stages one and three?" "Granted, we're still physically stuck inside our universe. But by learning as much as we can about it, enough, anyway, to deduce its initial conditions, and especially the fundamental, underlying principle driving the evolution of the universe, which I'm saying is energy's search for equilibrium, we can begin to identify where the universe is heading; what it's doing and so forth. Then, assuming that this end product or state of being of the universe has some connection to the parent reality, we can begin to theorize what this connection might be; thereby giving us some information about the parent reality itself. Similarly, having identified the initial conditions, we can begin to figure out what would have had to happen in the parent reality to cause the universe to exist and act the way it does. But first, before we can even entertain such thoughts, we need to recognize that there is a reality-a physical reality just as physical as our universe-bigger and older than the universe within which the universe exists." "All right, then, I guess I can buy that. But you better be leading up to something here. What is it?" "That's the question I was hoping you would ask. Imagine you have in your hand one of those light, foam rubber balls that kids play with." "You mean a nerf ball?" "Yeah, that's it. Let's say you squeeze it up into a really tight little ball and then release it. Naturally it's going to spring back to its original size and shape. So what causes it to do that?" "It's elasticity, of course. Is this how you're saying our universe started? That our universe is like a giant nerf ball?" "In a very general way, yes I am. But, of course, there's a whole lot more to it than that. First of all, I say this because it appears the evolution of the universe can be so well explained if we assume that its energy is constantly searching for ever more stable states of equilibrium. In the second place, this constant search for equilibrium strongly implies that the universe's energy had to have been in a highly unstable state of equilibrium at the beginning of the big bang. Finally, then, it seems only reasonable to assume that, like a foam rubber ball, the universe's energy was originally distributed evenly throughout the space of its parent reality before it was somehow squeezed into a tiny ball. Because of the energy's elasticity, the work required to do the squeezing would then show up as the potential energy of the ball. All that needed to be done, then, was to release the ball, in which case the highly unstable energy would immediately seek, by means of traveling E waves, to return, or fall, if you will, back to its original state of completely stable equilibrium." "If that's true, then where did matter and the rest of our universe come from?" "Enter the symmetry-breaking event. However it happened, whether the expanding E waves encountered some already existing high energy field, or whether, perhaps, in their helical expansion they interfered with each other at the very beginning of the big bang when they were so close together, somehow, some of the E waves were torn up into bits and pieces, which were then forced into the tight little standing waves we call particles." "And this was the beginning of our universe?" "Yes, I think so. As a matter of fact, if you think about it, if the earlier discussion about the origin of what I'm calling Newtonian time is correct, our universe couldn't actually begin until the standing wave particles began to form. Now I don't want to get too cute here, but it's tempting to speculate that our universe may not actually have started at exactly the same time the energy was released to begin the big bang. That there may have been some time delay, measured, of course, in the parent reality's time, between the beginning of the big bang and the beginning of our universe. But, like so many other things here, I need to leave that to others to resolve." "I don't know. It all sounds promising. But all this depends on some assumptions you made about a parent reality we don't even know exists. I'm still having a lot of trouble with that." "I hear you. But I didn't just pull these ideas about energy elasticity and squeezing it into a tight little ball in some completely unknown parent reality, and so forth, out of a hat. The bottom line here is that if we make these assumptions, then I think we'll be able to answer all the questions on that sheet of paper you're holding. As a matter of fact, like I said earlier, even I can answer a lot of them right now. All things considered, then, I think that the overall world view I'm proposing here is at least a good place to start." "Perhaps so. (The young man begins again to look at the list.) All right. I see here, starting at the top, that you've come up with at least a few ideas about the nature of energy, and you talked earlier about how it might propagate through space, but do you know why it always travels at the speed of light?" "I think you have to remember here that E waves probably appeared before our universe began. Based on that, it's my opinion that, while our universe of Newtonian matter has its own dimensions of time and space, it actually exists within the larger, older space-time of its parent reality. So, if you think about it, we're talking here about one set of space-time dimensions actually existing within another set of space-time dimensions. For an analogy consider a large, indoor swimming pool. Let's say it's late at night so that the water's very quiet and the underwater lights are on. Then let's say you're able to carefully place a capsule of blue dye in the middle of the pool so as not to disturb the water. Then let's say the capsule, because its gelatin coating has a specific gravity just slightly greater than the water, begins to slowly sink until, when it's half way to the bottom, the gelatin coating dissolves and the dye begins to spread out symmetrically in all directions." "Kind of like our big bang." "Right. After a given period of time, then, you could say that there are two sets of space and time dimensions here. One for the blue-dye world and one for the larger, parent swimming pool. With one set inside the other. Now, if you were to shine a narrow beam of light from one side of the pool to the other so that it passed through the blue-dye world, it would exist in both space-times at once. But, you would say, all this is of no real importance since the two sets of dimensions have a one-to-one correlation to each other. And you would be right. However, and now I'm switching back to the idea of our universe existing within its parent reality, as Einstein mathematically demonstrated in his theories of special and general relativity, our clocks can slow down so that our time does not pass at the same rate that time passes in our parent reality. In the case of special relativity, time passes slower for matter when it is in motion. And we've already talked about how this gives us two separate dimensions of time, one within the other. In the case of general relativity, where the slowing of our time is, because of gravitational fields, a function of position in space, then, according to Einstein, our space will undergo a degree of expansion related directly to the slowing of our time in that space. This means that there have to be not only two dimensions of time, one within the other, so that Newtonian time can slow down while the other one doesn't, but two sets of three-dimensional space, so that one set can expand while the other set doesn't. Why does this expansion of space happen in the case of general relativity? Well, let me put it this way. Like the blue-dye universe, our universe exists within a larger reality. But we don't know this yet because we're made of matter. And, until the last couple of centuries, we've only been interested in what goes on, what changes take place and so forth, in our Newtonian world of matter. So we only measure changes that take place in it in terms of our own Newtonian time and space. Now it's true that energy in the form of traveling E waves is an integral part of what goes on in our universe. It can interact with our matter; we can turn on a light and cause light waves to radiate in all directions like a mini-big bang. So, obviously, we've always thought of traveling waves as being part of our universe just like everything else. But then along comes Einstein, who basically says that you know, I can mathematically model what happens to objects when their speed begins to approach the speed of light, and what happens to space and time in a gravitational field, if we assume the speed of light, for some reason or other, never changes. But no one's ever been able to figure out why the speed of light never changes. I'm saying it's because, while light waves do indeed interact to some degree with the standing waves of our universe, they actually are a part of the larger, parent reality within which our universe exists. It's sort of like someone standing in the yard outside the house, reaching into the house through a window to do something inside the house. Only in our case the inside of the house and the outside of the house are in the same place. We can make matter speed up and slow down. But we can't make light waves speed up and slow down because they're always part of the parent reality. We can bend them and so forth, but we can't speed them up or slow them down because their speed is controlled by the dynamics of the parent reality. As to why the speed of light is exactly what it is, well, I'd say that equilibrium considerations come into play in the parent reality the same as they do in our own little Newtonian universe. That being the case, light waves, which, remember, are always trying to spread out in search of their original long lost state of absolutely stable equilibrium, are going to propagate at whatever single speed requires the least amount of effort to get there. Remember, elasticity's always working, even in between states. Which is where, by the way, the least action principle comes in. In other words, for them to propagate any faster or slower, extra work's going to have to be done on them. Now of course, like all this stuff I've been telling you, I'm only engaging in some speculative metaphysics here, and not physics. But if I'm right, or mostly so, then wherever gravitational considerations cause a slowing of our Newtonian clocks, the Newtonian space there is going to have to stretch or expand so that light waves can continue to move at the same speed in our universe as they must do in the parent reality. In fact, if you think about it, while we are taught that Einstein's theory of relativity expresses the relativity of our scientific laws in gravitational fields or when matter is in motion, as well as the relationship that truly does exist between our time and our space, he actually did more than that. What he really did, through the use of the constant speed of light, is begin to express the relativity of our universe's space-time to the space-time of its parent reality. As a matter of fact, when Einstein imagined himself to be riding a light wave so he could look at the universe from that point of view, he was probably the first living human being to imagine himself outside the universe. Now I don't know if he thought about what he was doing in that way, but I do know the rest of us are going to have to start thinking about the larger, older, and likewise physical parent reality within which our universe exists if we're ever going to completely understand the origin, nature, and reason for our universe." "According to you, then, using helical wave propagation and equilibrium considerations, plus the idea that our universe exists within a larger reality with its own space and time, we ought to be able to account for everything in the universe, right?" "That's mostly right. But remember, we still haven't accounted for the existence of gravity. Like I said, I'm still working on that." "Well, yeah, but if the universe is composed entirely of electromagnetic waves in the form of either traveling waves or standing waves, then using your initial conditions, everything in the universe, even gravity, should be explainable in terms of E waves. Right?" "If there are only these initial conditions, and they've been correctly identified, then yes, you're right. But there may be another initial condition lurking out there which is responsible for the existence of gravity in our universe. However, like you just said, I'm also starting to think that we don't need anything else. That once physicists and other scientists start investigating the fields around standing waves, they're going to find out that these still-to-be-determined fields might very well be very faint but extend over great distances. Further, they might find that, just as two electrons traveling side-by-side in the same direction are attracted by their motion-induced electromagnetic fields, so might the same two particles, side-by-side but motionless, be similarly attracted by the interaction of their standing-wave fields. Again, if this attraction is very weak, but somehow extends over great distances, then they'll be able to explain the gravitational force." "But there's the matter of time slowing down in a gravitational field." "Yes, but when E fields interact, reflected impedance considerations might somehow distort or otherwise impede the normally smooth and spherical spin of the particles, causing the particle spin rate to decrease by just a tiny fraction. Just as in the case of special relativity, then, we'd have a slowing of Newtonian time for all the particles involved. And the more particles involved, in other words the greater the concentration of mass, the greater the mutual attraction and the slowing of time." "And with Newtonian time slowing, like you said, Newtonian space must stretch or expand to keep the speed of light a constant." "That's about it. But, like I say, I really don't have things figured out yet. Just like you're doing now, before I can go much farther here, I'm going to have to go back and review all of Maxwell's equations and so forth. And I have to tell you, once I get all this stuff we've been talking about right now written down, it'll be a while before I'm going to want to go on to do that. Besides, there's a lot of other people better equipped, mentally and otherwise, to do what needs to be done here." "You know, I've got some friends at CU who I'll bet would be interested in this. Would you mind if I told them about it?" "Not at all! As a matter of fact, the people who really need to think about this stuff are the students who're just now learning how to mathematically model the universe. Their minds are still open to whatever ideas might help them to understand the physical universe. I've been working on this idea about the importance of equilibrium considerations off and on now for close to 30 years. But I mostly just stumbled around not making much sense of it all until finally, just a couple of years ago, I realized that it's the property of elasticity which is responsible for energy's constant search for equilibrium. That from the beginning of the big bang all the energy in the universe has been trying to do nothing else but return to equilibrium by the quickest and easiest way. About the same time the idea of helical wave propagation came to me as well. But the point I want to make here is that learning to think of the universe as being only part of a larger reality, and that it owes its existence to, and can therefore only be completely explained in terms of that larger reality, is not an easy thing to do. And in particular for those of us who were raised to think of the universe as being all there is to reality. So, yes, by all means talk to anyone you want to about this stuff. But especially to the younger ones." "You have to understand, though, I'm not sure anyone's going to believe what you've been saying here. Not at first, anyway. To tell you the truth, I know I'm having a hard time with it." "Well then, let me make another point here. I'm not trying to lecture, or preach to you about all this. It's certainly true that, because of all the time and effort I've put into this that I myself believe, for the most part anyway, that what we've been talking about here is indeed the truth, and the right way to think about the universe, and so forth. But in the long run it's not important what I think or believe is the truth. If you think about it, what we're really after is the wisdom to always do the right thing. To always act in our own best interest. Now I know people always say that the ultimate goal of science is to understand the universe. But that's not the end of it. What the human race is really after is wisdom. So the real value of knowledge and understanding of the universe lies mainly in the fact that these truths will lead us to the wisdom we need. But we have to make sure the knowledge and understanding we end up with is the actual truth, which dictionaries define as an accurate description of the way things are. And that absolutely accurate description has to be left to trained scientists and metaphysicists. Then the moral philosophers can take over and finally give us the wisdom we need. All I'm saying is, when they find the truth about the universe, what I'm talking about here in the most general of terms is most likely what they'll find. And if by knowing what we've talked about here today will maybe do some of them some good, maybe start some of them off in the right direction, well, that's great." "I hope you're right. And I'll keep that in mind. Speaking of which, looking at your list here, what about the horizon problem? Can you explain that?" "Actually, I think it's more accurate to ask if the theory can answer the question, not I. But yes, it does. The horizon problem arises because physicists have found the universe to display large-scale homogeneity. Since the universe is expanding at essentially the speed of light, they haven't been able to conceive of how the universe could constantly adjust and readjust itself to maintain its homogeneity if the regulating process responsible for this homogeneity can't travel back and forth in the universe any faster than the horizons are expanding. However, with the world view I'm proposing, the large-scale homogeneity is not a function of some regulating process, but of the initial conditions of the big bang. Namely that the universe's energy, once released, explodes outward symmetrically-and homogeneously-in all directions precisely because it is naturally selecting the fastest and easiest way back to completely stable equilibrium. To put it another way, with this world view there is no horizon problem to begin with since the universe is bound to be homogeneous." "Then what about the boundary problem?" "There physicists have never been able to figure out whether the universe is expanding at an increasing rate, or whether it is slowing down, possibly because of gravity. Their calculations actually tell them it's expanding at a fairly constant rate exactly in between the other two, which they can't understand because such a case requires that the universe be in a constant state of unstable equilibrium. Something which does not seem possible. Again, however, with this world view, the energy of the universe, because of the initial conditions, is defined as being in a constant state of unstable equilibrium as it constantly seeks to return to its initial state of completely stable equilibrium. In which case, like the horizon problem, the only boundary problem would be if the universe's energy wasn't in a state of unstable equilibrium. As for the smoothness problem, I can't provide a solution for that one yet. I've already said the helical waves might have interfered with each other early on to tear up the E waves into bits and pieces. Or, and this is probably more along the line of what the physicist Higgs was talking about, maybe when the universe's energy was originally being compressed, some other energy tried to fill in the empty space that would have been left in the parent reality. So when the universe's energy was released, it may well have slammed right into the other energy. But right now I'm willing to leave that one completely to the theorists." "Since you mentioned it, do you think this world view will also solve the mystery of the Higgs boson? I was recently reading where a high-powered team of physicists at the Fermi Lab has been trying to separate the mass of a particle, which as I understand it was brought to the particle from the high energy field by the Higgs boson, from the rest of the particle using a particle accelerator. But they can't seem to find this boson." "Remember, Newton and others before him had observed that physical force needed to be applied to an object to speed it up and slow it down and so forth. They attributed this reluctance by an object to change its velocity, which they called inertia, to a property of matter they called mass. But no one's ever figured out where this property comes from. I'm proposing it comes from the fact that matter is, at its most fundamental level, made of standing wave particles. Now if you'll also remember, these standing wave particles, by their very nature, are in effect born with the property of mass, which is more in line with what Newton was thinking. So we don't have to add something to it, like this Higgs boson, to give it mass. And that's why, quite frankly, I don't think they ever will find a Higgs boson." "If that's true, those people at the Fermi Lab are going to be really disappointed." "And they're not going to be too thrilled with the first person to tell them so, either. So you can do that if you want to as well. But, actually, it's not exactly that there's no Higgs energy at all. It's there all right. And because of it a particle does indeed take on the property of mass. It's just that, as I see it anyway, this energy is just not quite in the form they think it is. I mean it's not a boson." "What is it, then?" If we go back to this world view once again, which, remember, requires that energy must always be seeking the most stable state of equilibrium available to it because....?" "Because it's just trying to get back to its original state of completely stable equilibrium." "You got it! Anyway, if energy in the form of traveling waves is a more stable state of equilibrium than a standing wave, it stands to reason that because some work had to be done on some of the originally expanding E waves to tear them up and form them into standing waves, one could argue that the only thing keeping standing wave particles from naturally falling once again back into traveling waves is the continued presence of this energy. Now I'm guessing, and right now this really is a pure guess, that the charge on a particle might be this energy. It's this charge, then, that I'm thinking might be the Higgs energy they're looking for. In other words, in this interpretation, which is consistent with what we've been saying so far about particles, the Higgs energy, or charge on the particle, while it doesn't actually contain the particle's mass, does cause the particle to possess the property of mass because the particle remains a standing wave as long as this charge is present." "So Higgs was on to something after all." "Yes indeed. Of course, since I know nothing of the mathematical models Higgs and others have been using in this area, I can't really say. However, if what we've just talked about is true, and again employing equilibrium considerations, then the magnitude of the charge, which represents the work done to roll the quantum of traveling wave into a standing wave particle, represents what one might say is the potential difference between the standing wave and its more stable traveling wave. Further, the polarity of the charge may represent some sort of direction of the standing wave from the more stable state of equilibrium as a traveling wave. Now I know this is a reach, even for me, but, again, if what I've just said is essentially true, then that could explain why unlike charges attract and like charges repel. Like charges are no good to each other in their constant search for equilibrium because they're, you might say, on the same side of equilibrium. As a matter of fact, they're counterproductive. So they repel each other. Unlike charges, on the other hand, attract because, in their respective particles' constant search for equilibrium, they're at exactly opposite, but identical distances from equilibrium. Thus, should two such particles of identical mass, like an electron and a positron, come close to each other, their mechanical consciences, so to speak, would cause them to seek each other out, and their charges would cancel, thereby allowing the standing waves to naturally fall back into a more stable state of equilibrium as a traveling wave." "Which event physicists have seen happen with electrons and positrons but so far can't explain." "Yes, but, you need to remember, I'm just still just theorizing here. It's true this explanation fits nicely with what I've been saying so far, and also with what physicists have been finding about particle mechanics, but the real work still needs to be done before the truth here will be known. But, as long as we're on the subject, this would also explain why particles of opposite charge, but unequal masses, like and electron and a proton, would still be attracted to each other, but imperfectly. So they form an atom. Which is one step closer to equilibrium. " "Well, I've got one more question for you." "Shoot." "All of this so far has been really interesting. But all of these things you've talked about so far, energy equilibrium, and relativity, and quantum mechanics, and Newtonian mechanics, and so forth only lead up to what to me, and to most others as well, are the most important questions of all. How did we human beings come to exist here on earth? And is there a reason for us? And, if so, what is it? Now I know Charles Darwin proposed his principle of natural selection as the means by which the first single cells formed into multi-celled organisms and then into us. But, kind of like the way I felt about Newton's third law until you straightened me out on it, I don't think Darwin's explanation really tells the whole story. By that I mean Darwin had to first assume the existence of living cells before he could even apply his theory. So what caused living cells to come into existence here on earth in the first place? How did we get from inanimate atoms and molecules to those first living cells. Can you, or, rather, does your theory explain this part of the universe's evolutionary process?" "Actually, by using equilibrium considerations to explain how the first living cells came to exist here on earth, and how they then evolved into multi-celled organisms, and, finally, into us, we really get a chance to see the power of this theory and how it almost effortlessly cuts across the intellectual barriers that have been separating the various scientific disciplines. Before I do this, however, I need to point out that, just as in the case of quantum mechanics, because I'm also almost totally ignorant of the science of biology, and especially microbiology, I can only describe how evolution takes place here on a large scale, purely qualitative level. But I think I can still give you plenty to think about." PART III FROM INANIMATE ATOMS AND MOLECULES TO LIVING CELLS AND HUMAN BEINGS To begin with, I think it's important to once again point out that equilibrium is defined as the state of energy or matter which, once achieved, results in no further action or change taking place. Usually we can say that some energy unit or compound of energy will achieve equilibrium in one of two ways, depending on the situation. The first case would be where the energy compound in question would seek to achieve equilibrium with another energy compound of somewhat similar size. This is the main area of interest addressed by quantum and Newtonian mechanics. Namely the give and take, so to speak, of energy or work back and forth between the two sub-systems until not only does each energy compound achieve its own state of equilibrium, but in doing so an overall systemic equilibrium is reached as well. The other most prevalent situation would be where an energy compound comes into contact with a much larger body, such as would be the case when a molecule, say, is in contact with the earth. In other words, where a smaller object is in contact with its much larger environment. In the case of the molecule and the earth, then, because it's the molecule which will undergo the greatest change before system equilibrium is reached, we tend to think of the earth, or environment, as already being in equilibrium, such that the molecule, to achieve its own equilibrium, must either import or export energy and work to or from the environment until it reaches the same state of equilibrium as the environment. However, when we start talking about what all the inanimate atoms and molecules which first existed on the earth's surface faced about a billion years ago as they first began to form the first living cells, well, it's sort of a good news, bad news situation. As far as the good news is concerned, there were of course astronomical quantities of different kinds of atoms and simpler molecules available at the beginning of this process. And the surface of the earth, at least near the equator, was held within a range of temperature and intensity of solar radiation which was conducive to the existence of living organisms. Also, there was a lot of surface water near the equator, which living organisms need, and within which the atoms and molecules could easily move around. Plus the water was salty from all the salts washed into it from the rivers and so forth which helped the atoms and molecules combine electromagnetically since salt water is a good electrical conductor. And, finally, because of the presence of our moon, twice-daily tidal surges must have turned the off-shore surfaces of the earth's oceans into something like a giant blender, greatly increasing the chances for atoms and molecules to combine into different, and more complex, molecules. Now for the bad news. As I just stated, in this particular instance the atoms and molecules, as they began to combine with each other would normally be inclined to seek equilibrium with respect to each other as well as with respect to their much larger environment. But there's a problem here. The earth's surface, because of the daily variations in temperature and intensity of solar radiation, plus the constant tidal surges, which, while they increased the chances for combinant activity, also served to destabilize the off-shore waters, presented an environment that was itself far from equilibrium. Certainly far enough from equilibrium that, after uncounted trillions of combining, falling apart and then recombining again into often slightly different combinations of molecules, certain colonies or cells of molecules would eventually form with the capability of achieving their own separate most stable state of equilibrium at some distance, equilibrium-wise, from their environment. A state which, while not itself a very stable state at all compared to those achieved by rocks and so forth, was still more stable then the degree of equilibrium experienced by the surrounding environment. To maintain this state, though, these cells had to develop the capability of constantly, but sometimes at varying rates when necessary, take on energy from their environment to maintain their separation, equilibrium-wise, from the environment. Are you with me so far?" "Where does the ability to reproduce come into this?" "I'm not sure, but it probably had something to do with the cell's constant need to take on energy to stay isolated from the environment. Maybe these colonies, by learning to reproduce themselves, not only were able to use reproduction as a means of achieving generational equilibrium, but also required them to constantly take on large quantities of energy, effectively separating them, equilibrium-wise, from their environment. Or maybe the reverse happened. Maybe they first learned, through natural selection, to constantly take on large quantities of energy to separate themselves, equilibrium-wise, from their constantly changing environment, and reproducing was just a handy way of using up this excess energy. Like I said, it gets real complicated here real quick, so I'm perfectly happy to leave the particulars here to the microbiologists. However it happened, by natural selection-but remember, natural selection of most stable states of equilibrium-these cells learned to work from a core set of molecules, which we call DNA, and just keep reproducing themselves over and over. This would allow for small structural changes to take place in some of the cells, thereby providing a way for the species to once again naturally select new cell structures that maintained just the right distance, equilibrium-wise, from the environment. And that's probably where sex came into reproduction. To be able to mix and match DNA from other sources would increase the range of reproductive natural selection. Again, I'll leave this to the microbiologists. The point I want to make, though, is that natural selection in living organisms takes place for the same reason it does in inanimate forms of energy. To constantly seek out ever more stable states of equilibrium. Does that make sense to you?" "I think so. You're saying living cells exist in a state of equilibrium the stability of which is somewhere between that more stable equilibrium experienced by the individual molecules on the one hand and the more unstable equilibrium of the environment on the other. Right?" "That's about it." "Well, if that's true, why didn't they just stay in the more stable state where they were before they combined?" "For an answer to that one, let's go back to the very beginning of the universe. Right after the original particles of matter formed. Now if you'll remember, these individual particles have a surface charge, the magnitude of which represents the distance, again equilibrium-wise, from the far more stable state of equilibrium enjoyed by traveling E waves. Or at least that's what I'm proposing. And, again as we talked about, some of these particles, the luckier ones you might say, were able to quickly recombine with particles of equal mass but opposite charge so that, by canceling out completely their surface charges, they both could fall back into the more stable state of a traveling wave and continue on their way at the speed of light toward pure E wave equilibrium. As for the other particles, they have, from that very first moment of their existence, had no recourse but to seek to return to equilibrium by whatever way they could. Thus, conditions permitting, many of them were able to first combine imperfectly with other particles of opposite charges but different masses to form atoms, with the atoms then proceeding, again where conditions permit, to combine into molecules. Now if you think about it, as each one of these combinatory steps takes place, the overall surface charge of the structure decreases. In other words, whereas some electrons were able to combine with positrons to immediately rid themselves of all their surface charge, all the others have, for 13 billion years now, give or take, been constantly in search of whatever other means were available to try and reduce that surface charge to zero so they could get back to being traveling waves. Getting back to your question, remember that all the molecules on earth, and especially those in the ocean waters just off-shore at the earth's equator, still have some molecular surface charge such that whenever the opportunity arises, they will combine with whatever atoms and molecules are available if the new molecular combination results in a smaller surface charge. Before we go any farther, though, I don't mean to say that the magnitude of the surface charge can be the only criterion determining whether atoms or molecules combine. There are other internal reasons as well. But I think you can see what I mean here. There were all these molecules in the oceans constantly bumping into each other. Whenever this contact resulted in a decrease in the overall surface charge, or for whatever other reason, the new more complex molecular structure would remain until it got colder at night, or the tide went out, or whatever, at which time the new structure might break up, or not. The overall point here, though, is that eventually, through what you might call weighted or directed trial and error, or natural selection if you will, some of these molecular structures were able remain together by finding a state of equilibrium separate from their environment. Does that answer your question?" "I think so. And there's something else that's just occurred to me. Physicists and microbiologists are always talking about how the complexity of matter is always increasing, and how this might be one of the driving forces causing evolution. You're basically taking complexity off the table by saying it's not a cause, but, as you say, another consequence." "Not only that, but increasing organization as well. Plus, this use of equilibrium considerations finally explains why, as Prigogine proved mathematically, the entropy in a living cell decreases. Almost anywhere else in the universe, the atoms and molecules, which originally existed individually, would never have combined into living cells, because living cells exist in states of less stable equilibrium than the states of equilibrium their original individual constituent molecules were in. But, because of the very unique environment existing here on earth, the individual molecules were constantly mixed and matched until, finally, colonies or cells of these molecules formed which could maintain their structure, and their unstable state of equilibrium, in spite of their unstable environment. Thus life in the form of single celled organisms first came to exist here on earth." "Very interesting. I assume, then, we go from single celled to multi-celled organisms using the same argument?" "Basically, yes. As Darwin realized, natural selection does indeed result in those organisms which are best adapted to their environment. But, while chance certainly plays some part in genetic mutation, and while evolution does indeed result in environmental adaptation, and all those other Darwinian considerations, not to mention increasing complexity and organization as well, none of these are fundamental causes of the evolution of living organisms. Life evolved here on earth-and is still evolving, by the way-for no other purpose than to achieve, and perhaps sometimes to maintain, ever more stable states of equilibrium." PART IV SUMMARIZING THE EVOLUTION OF THE PHYSICAL UNIVERSE "So I guess what you're saying is that the universe's energy has been constantly involved in the process of natural selection since the very beginning of time. But not in terms of ever increasing entropy, or Darwinian natural selection of most efficient life forms, or increasing complexity and organization. All of these things have indeed taken place. But these are not the causes of the universe's evolution, as scientists tend to think. Instead, they are but secondary consequences of a deeper, more fundamental mechanism driving the universe. The constant attempt by energy to return to its original state of absolutely stable equilibrium." "Exactly. But, as long as we're summarizing here, I think I should take a minute or two and talk about the idea of our universe as a constantly evolving process. First of all, we have to understand our universe, being a process, had a beginning, and will have an end. And there are other things we know about processes as well. For instance, we know that an individual process is completely defined by its initial conditions. More specifically, at the very beginning of any process, as a matter of fact even before the process begins, there has to exist a set of initial conditions, generally composed of the materials involved, their properties and characteristics, plus whatever forces and conditions which will be causing the process to proceed. In addition, there are what's called boundary conditions, which are the actual physical connections that exist between the process and its larger, older, parent reality, which can also come into play as the process proceeds, thereby altering the direction the process takes as it evolves. What's so great about these initial and boundary conditions is that if you know them, you can develop an overall mathematical model of the process which can accurately predict everything that's going to go on within the process as it evolves from its very beginning to its very end. Such a model, then, would allow us to completely understand the universe. What's going on anytime, anywhere, and so forth. As I said, these initial conditions must have been in place before the universe began. As a matter of fact, the universe couldn't have begun its evolution to its present state, and beyond, until they were in place. Right? Which brings us to the source of our problems as we try to understand our universe since, obviously, locked inside our process as we are, we appear to have no way to find out what went on before our process began in order to determine these initial and boundary conditions. But there is a way around this problem. If you think about it, our scientific community has already found out a lot about what's going on in our universe. In other words, we know a lot about what the initial conditions have caused to happen. That being the case, then might not it be possible for us to, with reason, and maybe some good luck as well, go back to the beginning of the universe and assume that particular set of initial conditions which would cause the universe to evolve to the state we know it to be in today?" "If so, why haven't scientists and philosophers been trying to do this all along?" "Actually, they have been trying to. I believe Feynman called it the search for the underlying rhythms of the universe. And in two different ways. First of all, some research scientists have been engaged in what's called reductionism. Basically, what they're trying to do is reduce as many of our physical laws as possible to a single, fundamental set of laws and principles. The laws and principles which must have existed at the beginning of the universe. The other way, as we've already talked about, has theoretical physicists constructing mathematical models of the current universe, and trying to take these models back mathematically to time zero to see what might have caused the universe to evolve as it did to its present state. I suppose you could call this mathematical reductionism." "Well, how come you could do it, and they can't?" "By making assumptions about the properties of energy and energy's search for equilibrium, and helical wave propagation, and the symmetry-breaking event, I've been able to explain the origin and nature of time, and general relativity, and how quantum and Newtonian mechanics and Darwinian natural selection are connected, and so forth. In other words, how the whole universe is connected. As soon as the scientific community figures out that the universe's energy is driven by its most fundamental need to return to equilibrium, which I'm saying they're going to figure out pretty quick now, they'll basically do what I've been telling you I've done. Only they'll do it right. They won't have to rely on a bunch of assumptions, some of them admittedly pretty far out, the way I've had to do. As I said earlier, when they get their super-collider working, they're going to finally break out of the box they've now unknowingly put themselves into. A box whose walls are constructed of quantum uncertainty, Newtonian chaos, and the belief that the universe, and life, are somehow sufficient unto themselves." "Maybe so, but I have to tell you, it might be really hard to get any theoretical physicists to even think about the big bang, and quantum mechanics, and time and relativity and so forth, the way you're talking about them. Let alone the way you're talking about the whole universe. As I understand it, they've been taught there really isn't any explanation for why particles, and time, and general relativity, and whatever, act the way they do. They're only concerned with developing mathematical models that predict the behavior of all these things without trying to figure out the mechanics of exactly how they work the way they do. Or the why of it either, for that matter. They just don't think that's possible to do. And I'm pretty sure most of them think that way. So if I were to tell them I met this guy who just might be able to explain how and why the universe works the way it does, they're not going to listen to me for even one minute. As a matter of fact, they're probably gonna laugh me out of the building." "Yes, I know. You have to understand, though, physics wasn't always taught that way. Originally, that is, before the 20th century, researchers like Galileo and Newton were first and foremost interested in figuring out exactly how things work the way they do. To figure out the mechanics of things. How things reacted to various forces, what properties would cause them to do this, and so forth. Then, when they understood the underlying principles involved, they'd compose a law, or set of laws, which would precisely describe, often mathematically, exactly what was going on. So science students, taking a class on Newtonian mechanics, say, or thermodynamics, would be taught these laws and how to use them to predict the behavior of things. And, of course, that's still the way these subjects are taught. But during the first part of the 20th century, when Bohr, Heisenberg, Einstein and others began learning more and more about atoms and their individual particles-electrons, protons, and neutrons, and such-they could never seem to explain exactly what was going on. For instance, it turned out that they couldn't completely describe the state of an electron in an atom. In other words, if they set up an experiment to measure the position of an electron in an atom at a particular time, they couldn't determine its momentum at that same time. Or vice versa. So Heisenberg came up with what he called the uncertainty principle for individual particles. Another problem had to do with the fact that in some experiments electrons would act like actual particles, with mass and so forth, and at other times they'd act like electromagnetic waves. And researchers couldn't understand this. So, since they couldn't seem to figure out a way to explain the mechanics of individual particles, they couldn't really come up with a set of laws stating what was going on. However, this didn't stop them. With some truly brilliant mathematical legerdemain, they've managed to develop mathematical models which will predict much of the behavior of particles. At least large quantities of particles. And of course they're still working on this. But, because they were never able to understand and explain how and why individual particles behave the way the way they do, they basically said that, well, it must be that the universe, at least down at the level of individual particles, is fundamentally uncertain and indeterminate. So let's just accept that and move on with our mathematical models. Of course, they're still using particle accelerators, and cloud chambers, and so forth, to run experiments on particles, and they're refining their mathematical models more and more, but for generations now students of theoretical physics have been taught that there is no way we're ever going to be able to explain exactly what's going on. So don't even try. Of course, we know that at first not all physicists agreed with this way of thinking. Albert Einstein, the greatest of them all, and some others too, felt that the universe really was, even down at the particle level, an orderly and therefore understandable place. As a matter of fact, the argument over this issue, spearheaded by Bohr on one side, and Einstein on the other, is still one of the most famous arguments in the annals of physics. But, since Einstein was unable to prove his point, like I said, particle physics is taught with mathematical models and not laws." "Still, though, you're saying that the universe is orderly. Even down at the level of individual particles. And that it is, as you say, therefore understandable. And that's my point. Few theoretical physicists, if any, are going to want to even think about what you're proposing. It goes completely against everything they've been taught." "Don't think I don't know it. And that's why, like I said earlier, if you're going to talk to any physicists about this, it's best if they're young ones. Because, you see, Einstein was right." PART V ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SCIENCE AND RELIGION "Now I know I've laid a whole lot of new ideas onto you in these last two and a half hours, so if you've got some questions, or there's something you want to go over again, I see we're going to have to wait for a gate to clear, so maybe I can review or otherwise clear up some things for you." "Well, of course, I wish you had all this written down so I could get a copy of it, because I know I'll be lucky to remember half of what you've said. But rather than go over any of it, there's one last question I'd like to ask." "Shoot." "I know this is getting way off the subject, but something's been bothering me about all this. And especially when you started talking about how we human beings came into existence. Do you realize this world view of yours is going to be viewed as contrary to the religious beliefs of a lot of people?" "In what way?" "Well, some Christians believe that the existence of life on earth, and in particular the existence of us human beings, is the result of some sort of miracle performed by God. And, being a miracle, some think we're not supposed to know how it happened. But you're saying, or, rather, your theory is saying, that there's nothing at all miraculous about the universe, and life, or anything else. Everything's the result of purely physical and mundane evolutionary processes." "Actually, you're not off the subject at all. Understanding the relationship between science and the world's great religions is really the ultimate consequence of this world view. I just hadn't got to it yet. And, to tell you the truth, I generally try to steer away from discussing religion, and religious beliefs, and so forth with anyone, let alone someone I've just met. Like politics, most people are pretty set in their ways about their religious beliefs, whether they do or don't believe in God or a life after death, and aren't much interested in what others believe, unless they happen to agree. Besides, even though I think there's a lot of good stuff in this theory, nobody's going to pay much attention to it until the pros figure it out for themselves. So I don't see any percentage in getting into a discussion about what this theory will, or will not, eventually mean to us. But, as far as your comment about this world view stating specifically that the existence of life here on earth is not a miracle, well, I must take exception to that. Granted, I'm saying the existence of life, and in particular human life, is the result of physical processes which began even before the big bang started. But to say the universe from beginning to end is not a miracle, or at least is not truly miraculous in its nature, is, I think, missing the whole point of what we've been talking about here. Now, once again, I'm not trying to preach, or otherwise try to convince you to believe everything I'm saying here. Lord knows I have no business trying to do that. And especially when it comes to religion. But I would hate for you to get off this plane with the idea that this theory does nothing but weigh in on the side of science in the old, and, frankly, totally bogus argument that some say has to exist between science and religion. So, since you brought it up, I'd like to briefly get into this matter. I know nothing of your religious beliefs, but whatever they are, I think you might be interested in how closely science and the world's great religions actually relate to each other. Or rather, how close they will relate to each other once scholars verify what I think is the general truth of this theory. So will you give me a few more minutes to bring some closure to this entire subject?" "If you really think it's that important, then of course I'll hear what you have to say. But I have to tell you, I don't believe in the existence of a God, or a life after death. So, yes, I'll listen to what you have to say. After all, I did indeed bring it up. But I don't think you can change my mind." "For what it's worth, for most of my life, up until just a few years ago in fact, I felt the same way you feel right now. But I have to tell you, as a result of what this theory is teaching me about the universe, my beliefs about God, and life after death, and so forth, have changed 180 degrees." "Well, I've found what you've said so far to be extremely interesting. And I suppose I ought to hear you out about what you have to say about religion and science. It's just that I wanted you to know how I feel about religion going in." "Fair enough. As a matter of fact, while we're at it, going in I want to make clear how I'll be talking about religion. To begin with, if you think about it, there are two very general types of religious beliefs. At least as far as the world's great monotheistic religions are concerned. There are those beliefs which are specific to a particular religion, or even to a particular congregation within a religion. What some Christians may or may not think about what Christ actually said at a particular time would be an example. Such internal beliefs, matters of historical interpretation and so forth, are not covered by this theory. The beliefs we are concerned with here are those beliefs which all of the world's great religions generally have in common, of which, as I see it anyway, there are four. First there's the belief that there is a world beyond the world of our senses. Second, that in each human being there is an immortal spirit, or life force, or soul which, upon the death of the rest of our bodies, is somehow set free to move into that world beyond. Third, that to successfully make the journey to that world beyond, each of us must act in a particular way during this life time. Specifically, we're to live in peace and harmony with others and the world around us, and just generally live lives of goodness and mercy. And finally, that there is a Creator of unimaginable power, and wisdom, and infinite mercy, living in that world beyond who created the universe and all that is in it, including us. Now I know not all the great religions portray these four beliefs in exactly the same way, but I think you'll agree that in general these beliefs are not only common to each religion, but are also the most important beliefs as well. By that I mean in a very general sense they provide the foundation or cornerstones upon which each of these great religions rest. Agreed?" "Some people might argue with your wording, but, yes, I think you're mostly on the right track." "Good. As for the wording I used, I did so because it is in this form that these core beliefs, at least to me anyway, will eventually be found to fit perfectly into this theory. Or vice versa, if you prefer. That is, once it's completed, and proved, and so forth." "At this point I don't see that happening at all." "Right. Remember when I talked about how the two step process of first gaining scientific knowledge, and how this then leads to understanding? And how these two steps then lead to wisdom?" "For the most part." "Well, to begin with, I think we need to take a closer look at this idea of wisdom, which is generally considered to be the domain of moral philosophers. Even though we humans are ourselves compounds of energy just like everything else in the universe, because of the ever increasing complexity and organization of these compounds as they've evolved, humans, because of our superior brains, and in particular because of our astronomically large memory banks, have ended up with certain capabilities unknown to the rest of the world. Two of these I'll call awareness and choice. By awareness I mean the capability of being aware of our own existence, the existence of the world around us, and how the two often interact. By choice I mean the capability, again generally unknown elsewhere in the universe, of choosing our own behavior. But with choice naturally comes the responsibility of always acting in our own best interests. Right? So where do we get this wiseness, or wisdom as we call it? Why, by gaining as much knowledge and understanding of the world as we possibly can. With increasing awareness, then, or more specifically, increasing knowledge and understanding, comes increasing wisdom. So where does religion weigh in on all this? It turns out it comes in where wisdom is concerned. To consider that, let's first look at the concept of morality, and specifically the issues of right and wrong, or, as our religions tend to think of these, good and evil. So how do you tell if some thought, or action, or event, or something like that is right or wrong? Well, actually, it all depends. You see, the right and wrong of thoughts and actions and so forth are determined by the goals you wish to achieve. In other words, first pick a goal. Having done so, you can then look at various thoughts and actions, events and so forth. Quite simply, those which help you achieve your goal are considered to be right behavior and events and so forth; at least as far as that goal is concerned; while those which inhibit the achievement of that goal are wrong thoughts and actions and events." "But according to you, then, right and wrong are purely arbitrary. I mean, different people have different goals. So they're perception of right and wrong is bound to differ from the perceptions of others with different agendas. I mean, that being the case, it's no wonder there's so much arguing and fighting going on." "And you're absolutely right. As far as you go. But what happens if we all were to agree on a common goal? A higher purpose so to speak. A goal so much more important than all other goals, that the rightness or wrongness of all behavior and events are to be from that day forward considered relative to this ultimate goal, with all other value systems subservient to it?" "Well, then, if we could indeed come up with such a goal, I guess we'd all end up agreeing on what's right and what's wrong with just about everything." "Absolutely. At least with all the really important things. And this is where the world's great religions come in. Remember the four core beliefs I just talked about. Basically, our religions are telling us that there is a life after this one. Right? A life that, because of its perfection, longevity, and its proximity to the Creator, to name three reasons, is far more important than this life. Now if that were to turn out to be the case, then wouldn't we all agree that all behavior and events, etc., of this life which help us achieve this afterlife, this ultimate goal, are right, or as our religions put it, good, with all the behavior and events and so forth which impede the achievement of this goal as wrong, or evil? More specifically, if it were to turn out that living a life of goodness and mercy were to be the key to the achievement of this afterlife, and we believed this beyond a shadow of a doubt, then wouldn't we all be in agreement on how we should behave?" "Well, yes, of course we'd be bound to agree. But the fact remains, our religions have so far failed to convince us, or at least a large percentage of us, that there is any sort of afterlife, and that we should therefore always live lives of goodness and mercy in order to achieve that afterlife. In fact, then, our religions have failed us. And rather miserably, I might add. So where are you going with all this?" "Before I go any farther, let me say that this theory tells us quite clearly it's not that our religions have failed us, as you've suggested, but we who have failed our religions. But, getting back to our discussion, what if science were to weigh in on the side of religion here. What if science were to find out, purely from the physical evidence gained from finally understanding the universe, that there is a creator, and an afterlife, just as our religions say there are? And, further, again purely from the physical evidence, that we can only achieve this afterlife by indeed living this part of our existence in the ways of goodness and mercy? Or, to put it more specifically, let's say that scientists and philosophers, by finally achieving complete knowledge and understanding of the universe, were to conclude that the universe could not have existed without the intervention of a Creator, such that the universe is the Creator's universe, with all the truth about knowledge and understanding the Creator's truth, and all the wisdom to derive from this truth the Creator's wisdom. Then if they were to find, again purely from the physical evidence, that this wisdom is the same wisdom Moses brought down from Mt. Sinai, wouldn't science and religion, and thereby all of humanity, finally come to an agreement on what the universe is, how it came to exist, and why? And, most important of all, who we are, how we came to exist, and why?" "Oh, I certainly see what you're getting at here. But the fact remains, medical science knows a great deal about the human body, and, based upon what they know so far, there is no immortal soul tucked away anywhere. So here, it seems to me, we have a case where religion, which is about magic, and science, which is about observable and clearly understandable physical processes, do not in any way, shape, or form agree. No matter how much you might wish this to be so." "As you say, based upon what we know so far, no one could argue with you. But, let me point out that in these last two hours we've talked about how physicists, and mathematicians, and biologists, and philosophers might be very close to a much clearer understanding of the universe, and everything in it, than they know. Now I'm not saying that all these ideas about elasticity and helical wave motion proposed here are exactly correct. But I want to point out that if, just a few hours ago I had told you that sometime within this century scholars would have a fairly clear understanding of the universe, you probably would have said, and with complete confidence, that based upon what we know so far, we may never achieve such an understanding of the world. And now, while clearly, the proof of the thoughts I've laid on you must be left to the pros, I think I may have shaken your confidence just a bit. Right?" "While I'm still not convinced that all you've been saying is true, yes, I guess you could say that." "Good! Now, getting back to the question of the existence of an immortal soul within every human being, do you remember my pointing out that because of increasing complexity and organization humans have certain capabilities unknown to the rest of the universe? Including the capabilities of what I called awareness and choice? And how these are directly attributable to the superior brains of humans? And in particular to our enormous memory banks?" "Yes, I do." "Good again. Then what I'm going to do right now is lay on you the possibility of a third capability unique to humans which is also primarily attributable to our brain, and in particular to our memory banks. And that is immortality. However, I ought to point out that while I think the general considerations about awareness and choice for human beings are largely non-negotiable, the ideas I'm going to propose to you right now do not fall into that category. Rather, I'd say the confidence I have in them is about on the same level as the confidence I have in the ideas I proposed earlier about the origin and nature of gravity. In other words, I recognize these ideas to be purely hypothetical; with little evidence, if any, to back them up. I only propose them here because I want you to think twice before you insist that there can never, under any circumstances, exist within each one of our purely physical mortal bodies an also purely physical, but immortal soul capable of achieving a life after this one. To begin with, let's look more closely at our human memory banks, which, remember, are quite unique. At least in our known corner of the universe. It is strongly suspected that most, if not all, memories are permanently recorded in our memory banks. Certainly, the most important ones are. And that the main reason we can't recall our memories as well as we'd like is not because the memories aren't there anymore, but because our recall circuitry is not working as well as it should. More specifically, the storage process begins when the information contained in an idea is somehow communicated electrically to a suitable portion of the cerebral cortex where the memory banks are located. Once there these electrical signals in some way causes certain adjacent groups of the fundamental cells of the memory-I think they're called neurons-to be permanently electrically connected in such a way that the resultant pattern of these connections represents the information encoded in the original idea. As a result, when our central information processing circuits return to this area at some later date because they know this area of the brain is where this type of information is stored, and access or read out, so to speak, this information, the hard-wired neuronal pattern faithfully reproduces the information encoded in the original idea. And, if all the brain's circuitry is working right, we can recall this information whenever we like. Now you're an antenna man. At least you're working in that area right now. We know that all antennas are designed to transmit and receive information serially. By that I mean we design antennas to generate and receive an electromagnetic carrier wave of a single frequency which is serially encoded with information. Right?" "Right." "Well, what if there were a way to transmit information all at once? By that I mean, what if an antenna could be constructed such that, by exciting it with a pulse of energy, it would not transmit information serially but all at once, or in parallel?" "I can't imagine how you could do that." "Well, as I just said, antennas are now designed to transmit a carrier wave of essentially a single frequency with the information encoded serially on this carrier wave. To transmit some piece of information all at once, or in parallel you might say, what we'd need is an antenna designed so that each element of the antenna, perhaps because of its individual length, or because of how it is connected to adjacent elements, represents a single bit or piece of the overall information to be transmitted. That way, if all the elements required to completely encode a thought or message were properly arranged and connected, then if we were to excite this antenna array, let's call it, with electrical energy, might it not then transmit the entire message all at once?" "I don't know. But even if it did, you could only send one message. The single message you had encoded in the first place. And that would be a ridiculously wasteful use of an antenna. Which is a good reason for using a single carrier frequency the way we do now. Besides, it seems to me you'd probably have to have just as weird an antenna to receive the information. And it also seems to me that, just like the transmitting antenna, this one piece of information would probably be the only information the receiving antenna could ever receive as well. And one more thing. I can't see how this information, once it's transmitted, wouldn't interfere with itself as it's propagating through space, which is another good reason for transmitting information serially in the first place." "I know, I know. The problems here would seem to be insurmountable. Let me just point out, though, that if memories are encoded pretty much the way I described, then might not each hard-wired pattern of neurons, which encodes a specific piece of information, also double as a micro-antenna? In other words, if we were to consciously electrically excite a neuronal pattern in order to read out the memory or information it contains, might not the electrical energy flowing through the neuronal array also cause the array to act as an antenna and at the same time transmit the information in the form of electromagnetic waves just as a regular antenna would? Except the information, instead of being transmitted serially, would be transmitted in parallel. Certainly, if this were true, with the truly astronomical size of our memory banks, there's no telling how many of these memory antennas we might manufacture in a complete lifetime." "Yeah, but don't forget, any signals these micro-antennas send out, even if they transmit anything at all, are going to be of microscopically low amplitudes. So they're not going very far." "True. But remember the blue dye universe inside the swimming pool? And remember what I said about general relativity and how it could be explained if our universe existed inside some older, larger reality with its own dimensions of space and time? If this turns out to be true, then our parent reality is not spatially separate from us in the way we generally think of things as being separate. It's actually all around us. So, if you're talking about how much energy it's going to take to make the trip from this world to what we sometimes call the world beyond, well, beyond may not be as far away as we think. And it might not take much power to get there. Besides, this closeness of the parent reality to us would take care of the problem of the parallel-transmitted information interfering with itself. Maybe it doesn't have the time or space needed to interfere with itself before it gets to where it's going. And another thing. Maybe this would explain how close family members, and particularly twins, can seem to know when something happens to each other. The similarities in their DNA might cause them to form more similar neuronal patterns, thereby affording them a higher sensitivity to each other's transmissions. And still another thing. Maybe this would explain why people who think they're dying often say they saw their life flash before their eyes. Maybe the brain is designed to automatically transmit all the memories in the memory bank at such a time, and in doing so it also downloads all these memories into the central processor part of the brain, which we know is what it normally does anyway. And, finally, this almost completely different way of communicating between this world and its parent reality could explain why such extremely sensitive listening devices as we have available to us are unable to detect it." "OK, OK! I hear what you're saying. And, once again, I just never thought about our brain, and our thoughts and memories, in the way you've just described. And, once again, I'll try to keep in mind what you've just said when some scientific type starts talking about how there's no such thing as an immortal soul somewhere in our bodies. But, still, like you said, these are just ideas." "You're absolutely correct. And, frankly, it might be more politic of you, if you do indeed speak of this world view with your friends, to stick to what we've said about equilibrium considerations, and helical E wave propagation, and Newtonian mechanics, and so forth, and maybe steer clear of this discussion we've been having about the relationship between science and religion." "I'm not certain I can do that. The people I have in mind are super-sharp, and once I start telling them about time, and general relativity and the blue-dye universe, and elasticity, pretty quick they're going to start thinking about the possibility of a world beyond, and a Creator, and just generally how all this gets into the realm of religious beliefs. I just wish you had some more evidence I could give to them." "Right. Well, you know, there is some evidence you could bring up. That is, if you felt it worth bringing up at all. (Here he reaches for the sheet of paper with the list of scientific questions about the universe on it.) Remember me saying how with this theory I can answer just about all the questions listed here? And how the answers are all connected together so the physical universe, and evolution and so forth now makes very good sense?" "Yes." "Well, then. (He turns the paper over, exposing two shorter lists.) (Fig. 5) With regard to philosophy How do we define these terms? * Truth * Right, wrong * Good, evil * Beauty * Justice * Best form of government With regard to religion * Was the universe created? Is there a reason for it or was it accidentally formed? * Is there a creator? * Is there a reason for humanity or was it accidentally formed? * Is there more to reality than our known universe? * Is there an immortal soul in every human being? * Is there a life "after" this one? * What must we do to achieve it? Fig. 5 Regarding the questions about philosophy and religion, I think you can see that this theory can begin to give us absolute definitions for all these terms. Something philosophers have so far been totally unable to do." "Well, yes, it seems to me you came up with some decent definitions for right and wrong and good and evil. Speaking of which, are you saying this is all there is to evil? You know, don't you, that a lot of people think there's a Devil behind all the evil in the world. Are you saying there's no such being?" "Actually, when I finally began to figure out the universe, and also to begin to understand about right and wrong, and so forth, I used to think that this way of thinking did indeed completely explain the existence of all evil. That, in other words, the universe didn't need a Devil. But that was also at a time when I still did not believe in the existence of a Creator. Now I realize such a supposition was completely untrue. So, in answer to your question, having once thought there was no Creator, only to find out I was completely wrong, I'm not about to say there's no Devil. I just don't know. All I can say is, once we're able to nail down which human behavior is evil and which isn't, which, as I've said, philosophers should be able to do in a few generations, then evil human behavior should start tapering off. So if there is a Devil, He'll find no more profit here on this planet and will most likely be forced to move on. Not incidentally, I feel the same way about Hell. Maybe I'll come up with some thoughts about that sometime in the future. Right now all I can say is I don't know." "Fair enough. One more thought here. How can you can get the right form of government from this theory?" "Remember, I've been talking all along about how all the forms of inanimate energy in the universe are constantly searching for ever more stable states of equilibrium, sometimes relative to other energy compounds, and sometimes relative to their environment in general. Well, if you think about it, humans, being energy compounds themselves, must also be somehow, in some way, searching for equilibrium themselves, then, right? With other human beings and also the world around them. It seems to me quite reasonable to say that living in peace and harmony with others is the human expression of this search for equilibrium. After all, in such a situation, that is, when we're living in peace and harmony with others, there's no arguing going on, and there's a minimum amount of energy exchanging going on back and forth, except maybe when one person might give up some time and effort to help their neighbor reach a state of more stable peace or equilibrium. Now if you remember, I earlier proposed that inanimate energy's properties constituted a sort of mechanical conscience because it was these properties which caused inanimate energy to behave the way it does. Which is to always search for equilibrium. That being the case, then, as you suggested earlier, the human conscience, which is generally defined as that complex of ethical and moral principles that controls the behavior of a person, while it's far more complex than inanimate energy's mechanical equilibrium, seems to be acting in a similar way. Especially if humans can agree on what's right and what's wrong, and just generally how we're supposed to live and act from day to day. With all this in mind, then, it seems reasonable to say that inanimate energy's search for equilibrium is a reflection of God's will, or God's own conscience. Continuing along with that way of thinking, then, isn't it logical to think that our human conscience is also a reflection of God's will and conscience? If that's the case, then not only did God exist before the universe began, since He had to in order to create the universe, and must still exist outside of it as well, but He, or at least His conscience, exists deep within each one of us. In other words, God really is everywhere, just as our religions tell us. So it makes very good sense, then, for each of us, through prayer and reflection, to seek guidance from God's conscience that lies within each of us. Or, as we often do, in concert with others in a place of worship. Now I'm not saying God's presence everywhere is somehow limited to His conscience within us. I'm just saying the theory tells us at least this much about His physical presence in each and every human being." "I guess I'm beginning to see what you meant about the world being a magical place. Maybe even as magical as our religions have been telling us. But what does this have to do the right form of government?" "Well, if God's conscience is in each one of us, then reasonable people, by that I mean people who've been raised to respect the rights of others, and vice versa, will, if given a decent chance, figure out how to follow God's conscience and live in peace and harmony with others. But everybody's different. Each one of us sees the world just a little differently than everybody else. That's why each and every human being cherishes their own individual freedom. We want to find our own peace, and harmony, and love, our own goodness and mercy. But in our own way. So now let's look at what our founding father's sought to accomplish at that first Continental Congress. They knew they wanted to construct a form of democratic government where the rights of the majority would be promoted and protected. But they also knew that the only way to do this was with a government designed to protect the rights of the individual first and foremost. Because the majority's made up of individuals. And once you deny the individual his rights, they reasoned, then the loss of the rights of the majority is not far behind. Now I know it can be argued that in doing this they were only interested in protecting the direct political and religious rights of individuals and, thereby, the majority of American citizens, and not necessarily to achieve some higher purpose. Indeed, it can be pointed out that these same founding fathers refused to consider the problems of slavery and women's suffrage, which were in direct opposition to the moral code of our country's form of government as spelled out in the Declaration of Independence. But I still maintain that, these imperfections notwithstanding, the framers of our American form of government were directly influenced by the will and conscience of God which guides all reasonable human beings. And that's why, since they best reflect the will, the conscience, and the wisdom of God, as I see it anyway, our Declaration of Independence, our Constitution, and our Bill of Rights provide the best form of government." "Maybe that's why some people say that America is not so much a place, or a people. It's more of an ideal. A dream. A dream that's perhaps too perfect to completely come true. Certainly, our political process has been in some ways corrupted to the point where our founding fathers would turn over in their graves." "Yes, I know. And, for what it's worth, I could prescribe a perfectly legal and peaceful short-term course of action to solve all those problems. One so simple and, I think, agreeable to all that I cannot understand why it has not yet been proposed. But that's another story. For now, regarding the long term solution to all our problems, think what could happen if science were to find out there is a Creator. And there is a life after death. A life far better than this one. You have to think that if we no longer are burdened by this terrible fear of being dead that comes to all of us from time to time, which, even though we try not to think about it, has to inject a certain amount of stress into our daily lives. And we all know that stress feeds other negative emotions like suspicion, anger, and hatred. If, then, we could stop focusing on the immediate problems that are constantly coming up in this life, and instead, just as our great religions have been telling us all along, focus on the reason God put us here in the first place, which is our next life, then surely all the countries of the world would adopt a form of government similar to ours, and we could all live in peace." "If you're right, this may be the answer to the problems in the middle east. There's so much hatred there now that it seems both sides, or at least the leadership on both sides, may never permanently resolve their differences. At least not with what we know now about the universe. But, if we find out this theory is right, then that should change completely the way most of us feel about life, and ourselves, and others, no matter who they are." "Exactly. Until we understand and appreciate our next life, we will never understand and appreciate this one. But fear and hatred are not the only reasons for all the violence and terrorism and suffering in the world. Despair is generally defined as the belief that further positive action is useless. But to me there is a new, far more deadly, and still unrecognized type of despair seeping into the human psyche, generation by generation. The belief that life itself is useless. With the declining impact of religious beliefs in this and other countries, especially in the children, just such a belief might well be primarily responsible for the recent rise in the use of mind-altering drugs. Worse still, I think this new despair may be the catalyst for the recent acts of terrorism by young people. After all, if something is of no value whatsoever, then it's only one more small step to rationalize that there can be nothing morally wrong with destroying that which is of no value. Even life itself. Indeed, while reasonable gun laws should be implemented, and the behavior of young people toward each other in the schools needs to be looked into, I am convinced that, blinded by this new despair, the young Columbine killers had come to the tragic conclusion that there is no difference between life and death. With death, perhaps, in their case, seemingly preferable to life. For themselves or anyone else." By this time, having reached their gate some minutes earlier, the passengers in the front of the plane were beginning to file out into the terminal. As the young man began to gather his things the older man touches him on the sleeve. "Please, I have one more thing to say, if you don't mind, by way of sort of a bottom line to this discussion. Particularly because I'm concerned, what with the new way of thinking about the world and ourselves that must come from this theory, that you might easily misunderstand what I've been trying to say here. I assume from what you've said you're not particularly familiar with the Bible. Am I right?" "That's correct." "Even so, are you at all familiar with David's 23rd psalm?" "Oh, yes. I've heard it recited at funerals and such." "Good. Now I'm certainly no Biblical scholar myself, but if you remember, in this psalm David expresses the completeness of his trust in God. In the last two lines in particular, he summarizes his feelings by writing "Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever." By way of sort of calibrating what we' ve been talking about against such beautiful thoughts, let me point out that if David were to be alive when scholars finally understand the universe, I think he would compose the 23rd psalm exactly as he did those thousands of years ago. Except he might add just two words, such that the last two lines would read "Surely, memories of goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever." The point I want to make here is that our finally understanding the universe will not alter our religious beliefs, but, by taking us back to the wisdom of Moses, serve to clarify them." "I'll try to keep that in mind." With those near the front door beginning to move forward, phone numbers and addresses were exchanged, goodbyes were said, and the young man rose to take his place in the aisle. The older couple, as was their habit, looked out the window while waiting for the plane to empty, this time both thinking of the beaches they had visited on their short vacation in California. Some of the same beaches they had walked when they were falling in love so many years ago. After a few minutes, and with the plane almost empty now, the lady turned to her husband for a kiss, as if to bring closure to their trip. "Thank you," she said. "No, no, thank you!" he said, to complete the very old, and very private joke between them. Smiling, they began to move out into the almost empty aisle. Stretching as he did so, and reaching into the overhead for their jackets and travel bag, he asked "Well, what do you think?" "About the young man?" she said. "Yes. Do you think he actually bought any of what I was telling him?" "I don't know. The two of you had quite a conversation. And he seemed to be interested. On the other hand, he also seemed to be in a hurry to leave." "Well, yes, but whenever I used to get home from a trip I remember I couldn't wait to get off the plane, especially when I knew you and the kids were waiting for me." "Perhaps. But," and now she looked up into his eyes with just a touch of worry in hers, for she did not want to hurt his feelings, "he wasn't wearing a wedding ring". He quickly kissed her once again. "And thank you for that, too," he said. Laughing now, they turned, and, a bit stiffly at first, began moving toward the front of the plane. EPILOGUE The time was a little after 1:00 AM. They had picked up their luggage and their car, and, after making the uneventful trip home, were both tired from the day-long travel routine. After calling their children to let them know they were home safely, they had soup and sandwiches, and went to bed early. As was his habit, he awoke after about four hours, and began to think of the conversation with the young man on the plane. The universe is a big and complicated place, he thought. And he hoped he hadn't rambled too much as he tried to explain his theory to the young man. But there was an awful lot of ground to cover if one was to begin to truly understand the universe. Maybe, he thought, I shouldn't have made so much of an issue about the relationship between science and religion which will be bound to arise from this theory once scientists and philosophers begin to flesh it out. Maybe I should have just stuck to my own particular way of looking at the physical universe, and let it go at that. But the young man had brought it up, and besides, he truly disliked the often bitter, and totally unnecessary, row that had sprung up between science and Christianity. I hope, he thought, I stressed forcefully enough the idea that the connection between science and the world's great religions had to do with wisdom. That the human race above all needed wisdom. And that, thanks to our Creator, we humans have always had two ways to gain that wisdom. Through simple religious faith in God, and an afterlife, and the wisdom of the Ten Commandments, or, and very soon now, through the wisdom which will come from scientific knowledge and understanding of God's universe. He was also worried he may have destroyed any confidence the young man might have had in his theory when the discussion turned to the ideas of the brain as the location of the immortal soul. The young man saw immediately that he may have been reaching too far here. Perhaps, he thought, it would have helped if he had related his own personal reasons for being so certain there is an immortal soul in each of us. His mother had visited him one night in the fall of 1966, when he was 33. She had died of cancer some months earlier. So when she appeared, standing at the foot of the bed in a long, flowing white robe, he simply could not at first, or for many years after, believe he was experiencing anything but a dream. After all, at the time he was absolutely certain there was no such things as ghosts, or a life after death of any kind. He had immediately sat up in bed and looked away from her and around the room, which was lit by the glow from her body. He first looked to his right at his wife sleeping next to him, and then to his left at the night stand with the clock-radio on it. The green hands, close together, were pointing at about 3:15 AM. The bedroom window, open to the cool Arizona night air, let in some light, but not very much. After no more than a second or two, he looked again at his mother. Still there, she appeared younger than he had ever known her, perhaps in her early twenties. Her hair was long, down to her shoulders, something else he had never seen. Instead of actually standing on the floor, the folds of her robe ended in a small, slowly billowing cloud just below her knees. Her face was remarkably serene and peaceful. He remembered later that he himself had of course felt some surprise and wonder at seeing her. But he also remembered just generally feeling pleased more than anything else, as when a loved one might return unexpectedly from a long journey. After a few seconds more, during which time he was just beginning to get his wits about him enough to say something, she said "Don't worry, Joseph, everything will be all right." But the words didn't actually come from her mouth. Rather, although the voice was certainly her voice, he simply heard the words in his head. Immediately upon hearing her speak, extraordinarily powerful feelings of peace and harmony and love began to grow within him. In a few seconds these feelings became so strong that he simply could not handle them and began to pass out. The last he remembered was thinking, "oh, no!, mother, please don't go! I want to talk to you!", as his head hit the pillow. But he could not help himself. The next thing he knew the alarm went off at 5:30 AM, at which time he sat bolt upright in bed, remembering instantly what had happened. Had it been a dream, he wondered? Or had his mother actually visited him? No!, he thought, it had to be a dream! There's no such thing as ghosts! He got out of bed and walked around the house, his wife and children still asleep, trying to convince himself that it was a dream. Eventually, he decided the best thing was to try not to think about it and see if his mother might not visit him again that night. Maybe then he could determine if it was a dream or if it really, somehow, in some way, had actually been a visit from his mother. She did not return. Not that night, or ever again. Two days later he was sitting at their chrome dinette set after dinner. The neighborhood in those days was basically wall-to-wall children, and theirs, having finished eating, had raced out the front door to play with their friends for awhile before coming in for baths and bedtime. Right after they left, his wife, who had been clearing away the dishes, sat down across the table from him. "All right," she had said, in a calm but determined voice, "what's going on?" "What do you mean", he replied, but knowing what she meant. You haven't said a word for two days." Although he knew he probably shouldn't have been, given her powers of perception, he was still surprised that she was on to him. For he had thought he was being really cool about the whole thing. He had not wanted anyone at work, and especially his wife, to think he was crazy. So he had not said anything. But at least he knew his wife wouldn't tell anyone. And he really wanted to tell her anyway. So he recounted what he had by then come to think of as his dream. When he was through, she asked what night this had happened. When he said the night before last, she noted that yesterday was October 13th, his mother's birthday. She asked a few more questions, about how he felt and so forth, and then no more was said on the matter. But the dream would not go completely out of his mind, for there were some things about it he could not explain if it were only a dream. First of all, it was far too life-like. The instant he woke up the next morning he had remembered every detail, as one would if suddenly awakened in the middle of the night by, say, an unexpected visitor at the front door. And why would she pay him a visit like that, if she really did, and not talk to him for awhile? There were so many things he had wanted to ask her. And why did she cause him to experience those intense feelings? Feelings he would never forget. For surely, she must have caused them. And there was something else about them. Something truly extraordinary he could not explain. Eventually, though, he managed to talk himself into thinking it was just a dream. Most of the time, anyway. Until years later, when he felt he had finally come to understand the universe, and how there must be a Creator of infinite power, wisdom, goodness, and mercy. And how there must also be a life after death as well. For, as his theory of the universe was filling out, he also came to understand more fully the nature of those feelings. It was not a dream after all. His mother had purposely caused him to experience the afterlife that awaits each of us. The thing he could not understand about those feelings, besides their intensity, he finally realized, was that he was not himself experiencing them as we normally experience feelings in this life. He was those feelings! His body no longer existed, and all that was left of him were those feelings of peace, and harmony, and love, and goodness and mercy. And that's why his mother acted as she did. She knew if she just talked to him he would simply pass the conversation off forever as no more than a strange, extraordinary dream. This way, she knew he would, in spite of his own beliefs about there being no afterlife, always look for a way to explain those strange and beautiful feelings. And would not be able to do so until he realized there is a God, and there is a life after death. And that such feelings constitute, for each of us, our immortal soul. Tomorrow, he thought, I shall begin one last organization of my thoughts and writings on the universe, and God, and our life after death. And I'll make it available on the INTERNET to anyone who might want to read it. I guess I could just let well enough alone since I'm certain scholars will themselves soon understand the universe as I see it, and much more clearly. But there is so much fear, and anger, and hatred and despair in the world right now. It's ironic, he thought, I never ever considered I might become an apocalyptic thinker. I even used to make fun of those who would say the world was going to end on such and such a date. But now, I don't know, he thought, to be forewarned is forearmed, as they say. So even though people don't like to be told such things, we all need to realize the human race cannot continue to harbor fear, and hatred, and despair. We could do that and still survive up until about 50 years ago. But now we have the capability to destroy our entire human race. And, worse yet, especially with the possibility of the proliferation of biological weapons of mass destruction, it will soon come to the point where perhaps, rather than nations, even small numbers of individuals will possess such evil power. But then I'd also better tell them about my dream. The dream my mind always slips into whenever I try to think about the future of the human race. The time is a thousand years from now. The place a planet, much like earth, but far away. As his mind slows and drifts down through the clouds he sees the school and the children being taught, as always, the history of the human race. And each time, when they reach the year 2000, they learn that it was these generations of their ancestors who first saw an end to Hitlers, and wars, and starving children. And the beginning of the golden age of earth. His mind quieter now, he turned toward his beloved, and finally drifted off to sleep. And so, dear reader, I come to the final message of this work, which is what I personally have come to believe about God and His universe, and each and every one of us as well. Let me say right off that I have agonized right up to this very end whether I should write these last thoughts down or not, for, in telling you my own beliefs on these matters it will seem as if I am trying to convert you to my way of thinking about God and our life after death. Something which, as I have said before, I do not feel at all qualified to be doing. Especially since I've come to these beliefs so late in life. But, if only so that you'll know clearly what I now believe regarding these matters, and to bring some personal closure to this life-long work, I am compelled to do so. First, we are all immortal. For, whether my previous explanation be correct or not, I am convinced there is within every one of us an immortal soul which, with each act of love and goodness and mercy received by us from others, or given by us to others, has been building and growing since we first came to life in our mother's womb. Thus, you see, when God said to Moses "Thou Shalt Not Kill", He did not command this because death itself is wrong or evil, and something in and of itself which should be feared. But only because premature death for anyone is to be avoided at all costs since our immortal souls must be allowed to form and grow for as long as possible. And second, in a more general sense, God is saying to us that He does not care what language we speak, or the color of our skin. Nor does he care what religion we belong to. He only requires that we love one another, and live lives of goodness and mercy. And that if we do this, then when our life ends here on earth, our immortal souls will go on to live with Him, in His house, forever. To my children and grandchildren, and to those children of Columbine no longer with us, I dedicate this work. Joseph W. Reid Jr. June 10, 2002 1