This Blew My Mind!
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@mclaincausey I love this stuff…preach brother!
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Here is Tegmark’s pop science article about multiverses: https://space.mit.edu/home/tegmark/PDF/multiverse_sciam.pdf
Level 1: this is saying that the universe is likely to be large enough for a given configuration of particles in space to be infinitely replicated. So there would be an infinite number of copies of us, for example, across an unimaginably large swath of space and time. Anything that the laws of physics allows happens somewhere. Any possible configuration of particles within a given space happens somewhere. These would not be observable since they would be so far away and receding from us at over the speed of light—no signal could reach us. It is beyond our “cosmic horizon.“ while I think this is probable, it’s not testable and thus more philosophy than science, which is true of a lot of this. But there is reason to suspect it’s true.
Level 2: the predominant theory for the formation of our universe is called cosmic inflation. This theory predicts that we are in one of a possibly infinite number of “bubbles” that form after a period of inconceivably rapid expansion of the universe. Each bubble would have its own physical constants and laws of physics. If there is an infinite number of them, eventually one identical to ours would be out there.
Level 3: the most parsimonious explanation for the “weirdness” of quantum theory where a particle doesn’t have a position until it is observed is something called the universal wave function or the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, versus the Copenhagen interpretation which says the act of observation somehow collapses a waveform of probably locations into a single discrete location. This interpretation basically says that all locations are valid, and that the universe splits in along every valid location.
Level 4 gets into simulation theory and that we’re living effectively in a vast computer.
I think 1, 2, and 3 are probably true.
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Me, pretending to understand this thread, whilst wishing I hadn’t rewatched The Matrix yesterday…
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I only popped on here to look at the jeans.
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@Mizmazzle This honestly made me nauseated for a second as my brain tried to comprehend.
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Contemplating the infinite and how inconsequential we are on the cosmic scale can both “blow your mind” and lead to existential dread. For me it does the former but not the latter. If anything it just makes me more grateful to be here for what time I have. There’s a great documentary about infinity on Netflix that touches on that. Even though there will never be a way to be sure about the various multiverses, I have reasons to believe at least in the first 3 I won’t bore you with and believe the 4th is possible. None of it makes any functional difference in how I live my life.
@Matt what’s cool about it other than a natural desire to understand how it all came to be is that this kind of exploration can yield valuable outcomes. Without quantum mechanics, we wouldn’t have microprocessors or be talking right now, for example.
But also yeah, shag off ya tossers
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One thing is for sure: If this is a simulation I want to thank whoever is playing me for discovering the IH part of the map. And so early too, great job!
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went on a short city trip to Heidelberg and amongst many other great things I of course visited the Castle to discover this massive wine cask which absolutely blew my mind!
apparently a total of four versions were built, starting with the first in 1591 which was destroyed during the 30 years war to be used as fire wood
in the pictures you can see the fourth version built in 1751 which can hold 220.000 litres of wine. I should say COULD as it was never really water tight and was only filled completely three times.
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@WhiskeySandwich freaking nuts that it gets “many times hotter then the sun!!”
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They’ve gone at least 250,000 x the temperature of the core of the sun in particle accelerators: 4 trillion degrees Celsius, enough to decompose subatomic particles. For context, a type 2 supernova (when a huge star runs out of hydrogen and collapses / explodes with unimaginable violence) is (only) 2 billion degrees and that’s enough to create the heavy elements that we and our world are made of.
We really are made out of the remains of stars. Pretty cool.
Think it, be it.
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@mclaincausey …I do believe that some of us are more gaseous than others, especially after a night of drinking…
