{"id":139,"date":"2014-04-19T02:08:00","date_gmt":"2014-04-19T02:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/matthewclarksmith.com\/?p=139"},"modified":"2023-04-19T21:07:30","modified_gmt":"2023-04-19T21:07:30","slug":"secrets-of-the-universe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/matthewclarksmith.com\/?p=139","title":{"rendered":"Secrets of the Universe"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A telescope at the South Pole recently captured the world\u2019s first\u201cimage\u201d of a gravitational wave in space. The news seized the popular imagination and lit the Internet on fire. Yet few of us truly grasp what it was that was discovered, much less its implications for humanity. In search of a better understanding, we caught up with several leading scientists across the globe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is changer of game,\u201d raved Vyacheslav Sverdlov-Yerdmolov, of the Institute for Strategic Cosmology in Omsk. \u201cThere is Hubble, there is dark energy, there is this, these only. In cosmology, can be nothing more splendid. I hear news, I weep like infant.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pressed to explain a gravitational wave in layman\u2019s terms, Sverdlov-Yerdmolov compared it to a more familiar sort of wave. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThink of ripple in\u00a0Irtysh,\u00a0ripple in Ob.\u00a0OK?\u00a0Drop pebble in each, pebble is same. Ripple is same. Wait. Now,\u00a0drop pebble from far bank.\u00a0Is not same.\u00a0In\u00a0Ob\u00a0ripples\u00a0kaput<\/em>, for\u00a0Ob\u00a0like borscht, no good, forget it:\u00a0ripples is\u00a0zero. But in Irtysh\u00a0is\u00a0how many?\u00a0Ah! In Irtysh\u00a0ripples now four,\u00a0six,\u00a0eleven, for Irtysh pure like\u00a0skin of maiden. Now, we know\u00a0cosmos\u00a0is Irtysh.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Having no experience with either river, we struggled to wrap our minds around this. Yet British expert Cyril Bristley-Bockelthwaite, of the University of East Pudding, backed up his colleague while attributing even greater importance to the new finding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cForget Hubble. This is Copernicus, this is Darwin. This is one of those gigantic doors that\u2019s been shut for all time, and now it\u2019s been absolutely blasted open, and what\u2019s on the other side is just bloody overwhelming.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bristley-Bockelthwaite suggested a different way to visualize the emerging picture of the cosmos. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLook, up till now we\u2019ve thought of the space-time fabric as something like a tweed, or a gabardine. Well, the new result turns all that on its head. What we\u2019re dealing with is something much more like a chiffon, or really, to get just a bit more technical, more of a crepe-de-chine, or one of the heavier pongees. The best way to get a handle on this is to picture that precise <\/em>moment when the noils and baves separate during the reeling. Freeze it right there, and you\u2019ve got a picture of the universe at a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second old. It really is that simple.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But according to some, such as Jeanne-Marie-Fr\u00e9d\u00e9rique de l\u2019Haute-L\u00e9gume of France\u2019s Centre de la Physique Sup\u00e9rieure, the truly exciting part of the news is its wider implications \u2013 not for our own universe, but for what lies beyond. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt changes literally<\/em> every facet of human existence,\u201d said Ms. Haute-L\u00e9gume, who added that she has named her newborn daughter \u201cBicep-Deux,\u201d after the telescope behind the new discovery. \u201cWhen first I heard, I gathered my friends and family immediately. We sold our houses, everyone. There are possibilities open to us, today, that yesterday were dreams. No, not dreams, not even.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When we asked for examples, Ms. Haute-L\u00e9gume instead proposed another vivid metaphor. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat this tells us? Is that universes essentially are <\/em>just plastic bags from the supermarket. They are cheap, they are disposable, yes, they are sometimes difficult to open. And what becomes of them? They arrive always in the middle of the ocean, to drift in circles for all time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for gravity, \u201cits role should be obvious upon the slightest thought. Gravity of course is the supermarket cashier \u2013 though you must imagine one who is young, who is clumsy, who is perhaps a bit distracted by the pretty girl in the next line. This is what we mean when we speak about Lorentz invariance.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though Ms. Haute-L\u00e9gume\u2019s enthusiasm seems to be the norm, not every cosmologist has jumped on board with the latest findings. Among the most outspoken skeptics is T. Rust Head, director of the PELVIS-18 project, a competitor to BICEP2. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cListen, as we used to say, one shit-fly does not a manure pilemake,\u201d said Mr. Head by phone, characterizing his opponents\u2019 inflation theory as \u201cairy-fairy mumble-mouthed gobbledygook.\u201d He went on to explain his own alternative theory, which he has spent some twenty years developing, by way of reference to a classic film.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, it\u2019s partial nucleation \u2013 that\u2019s the technical term \u2013 but I like to call it the Indagine<\/em> <\/em>su<\/em> un <\/em>cittadino<\/em> al <\/em>di<\/em> <\/em>sopra<\/em> <\/em>di<\/em> <\/em>ogni<\/em><\/em>sospetto<\/em> model. If you\u2019ve seen the movie, and I hope to holy hell you have, you ain\u2019t likely to forget that opening scene. He kills his girlfriend, right? Just cuts her to pieces, does it in cold f______ blood, leaves all these clues on purpose, and then you spend the rest of the goddamned movie trying to figure out why.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr. Head went on to detail what the \u201cbubble boys\u201d \u2013 his term for proponents of inflation \u2013 have overlooked in their rush to rewrite cosmic history. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThink about it. Just f______ think about it for two seconds. You\u2019re the Ispettore<\/em>, right, you\u2019re the Big Bang, you\u2019re leaving this trail of evidence a mile long and it\u2019s about as useful as tits on a boar hog. Do you know the chances that this kind of signature survives a goddamned inflationary event? It\u2019s exactly the chances of the Kansas City Athletics winning the pennant in \u201967, all right? It\u2019s the chances of picking six balls off a Brazilian snooker table and having them all turn up the same color. See? What you\u2019ve got here is a bunch of damn cattle looking at each other\u2019s rear ends and calling \u2018em the moon.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though the BICEP2 team still has work to do to corroborate its findings and silence its critics, one thing is clear: cosmology just got a lot more interesting. And for some, that\u2019s enough to inspire a faith that borders on the religious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have seen God,\u201d said Cornell\u2019s Xizhao Xu recently, his cheeks still flushed from the excitement. \u201cAnd God speaks in linearized Einstein field equations.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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