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Do Black Holes Create New Universes? One of World's Leading Physicists Says "Yes"

6a00d8341bf7f753ef0120a7836279970b-320wi Chris Knight, the finest fictional physicist of our time, once said "All science.  No Philosophy.  Wrong."  It's true that an understanding of existence outside of equations is vital for scientists, both in terms of enjoying life and avoiding things like Agent Orange, but beware careless combination of the two.  A science/philosophy mixture can lead to metaphysical claims that the laws of physics are nothing but local zoning ordinances, as demonstrated by Lee Smolin.

Smolin is author of "the fecund universes theory" of cosmology which suggests that the rules of biology apply on the grandest scales, and is often referred to as "cosmological natural selection". Smolin summarized the idea in his book, The Life of the Cosmos.

The theory surmises that a collapsing black hole causes the emergence of a new universe on the "other side", whose fundamental constant parameters (speed of light, Planck length and so forth) may differ slightly from those of the universe where the black hole collapsed. Each universe therefore gives rise to as many new universes as it has black holes.

The Perimeter Institute theoretical physicist got together with philosopher Roberto Unger and arrived at three radically new conclusions. The first is that there is only one universe - the idea of a multiverse might be awesome science fiction, and essential to the slightly less credible string theory, but there's no reason to base your worldview on worlds where the Nazis won or the universal constant of gravitation has a different value.
The second idea is that time is real. Remember when you read that first sentence?  Okay, you agree with us - this is one of those discussions that takes place at a level regular humans don't argue at.  Some say that all of existence is a crystal of reality that we happen to move through, Dr Manhattan style, which is wonderfully imaginative but displays incredible cognitive disconnection. Even speaking the words aloud demonstrates the passage of time, and most arguments beyond that depend on bringing the debate to an extremely specific linguistic field of hyper-definitions that the opponent hasn't wasted their life learning, and will therefore "lose" at.  Luckily for us, Lee agrees that time actually exists and we can move on to the real problem: the idea of physics as local rules.

His argument that physics can change over time and space is apparently based on an extremely specific strawman argument which depends on separating experimental procedure into initial conditions and laws.  He says you can only arrive at laws by examining a large "configuration space" of possible setups.  In the lab you can set up a large number of tests, in cosmology you can look at a wide variety of situations, so in both you can arrive at laws.  His argument is that since you can't actually rearrange the stars themselves to set up different initial conditions in each place, you can't make conclusions about the physical laws there.  He uses many, many more words to describe this idea.

It's all very intellectually stimulating, but mainly demonstrates the difference between metaphysics and useful physics.  If you're going to claim that general relativity stops working beyond some sort of interstate-of-existence line, the burden of proof is on you to show that's the case - and strawman arguments on the nature of experimentation aren't going to cut it.  You can say that the plank constant is a variable over time and space, but when we want to build an bridge or a fusion reactor we're going to stick with our silly, provincial, non-new-book-publishing "actual physics."   And that's the difference.

Posted by Luke McKinney

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Aether Wave Theory is based on dense Aether concept and it's consistent with this idea, too. After all, if you believe, Universe could be formed inside of black hole, then the theory, vacuum is formed by immense hot & dense matter shouldn't be problem for you anymore.

Albeit I'm not quite sure, whether inside of Universe of certain density another Universe of the same density and size could be formed. In my opinion, if it could exist, then the daughter Universe would be more primitive in general. And not all black holes could form daughter Universe at all - IMO just those most massive, which are radiating to outside as so called quasars (white holes) could be considered as a potential candidates of daughter universes. We should realize, most of massive black holes tends to evaporate their matter into radiation, which would lead to the dissolution of daughter universe, too.

On the other hand, it's well known, prof. Smolin isn't friend of multiverse concept at all (it was proposed by string theorists first) - so I found somewhat surprising, the new theory is based just on his ideas. The reason is probably the vagueness of multiverse concept. In AWT parallel Universe is something like landscape under haze - you cannot see it, until you don't arrive into it. But with compare to real situation, it's probable, you would dissolve first into radiation a well before you could see something new. So there is philosphical question, if something could get into existence, when it's clear from very beginning, we could never observe it.

In this article Mr. Smolin proposes quite different paradigm

"There is only one universe. There are no others, nor is there anything isomorphic to it. This logically implies that there are no other universes, nor copies of our universe, whether within or without..."


Should "the plank constant" read "the Planck constant" or "Planck's constant"?

Whether the article points to parallel universe or about a scenario in the universe where the basic laws of physics are different is not clear .Does LHC creates another universe ..It creats a space where the Funamental laws as we know are no longer valid .The term another universe is mis leading. Every thing that occured after big bang which happened 15 billion years ago belongs to a single universe .(space, time,matter, fundemental physical laws ). Black holes wont create anothet universe as black hole /star death is it self part of the universe even though fundemental laws of time ,space and light are different after entering into the event Horizon.Even Black hole other than Galasctic neuclei decays .. The concept new universe can be used only if it is disconnected from the current one and only String ,super string ,M theory and Quantum loop gravity can explain birth of new universes or Multiverses .A universe with out starts in them , one where the primordial hydrogen had not clogged to form stars , where the laws of gravity is not applicable ... This has nothing to do with Black holes or quaser(a active galastic neuclei which emits radio waves)

Time is real? Of course, our perception of time is 'real'. But who's preception is 'real-er'? The person on orbit at 22,000 mi or the person on earth, because time flows differently for each. What about in a black hole, where time, in our frame of reference, effectively stops?

The idea that we have any clue at all what goes on at the heart of a black hole is simply silly. Since 'gravity' is really just space-time curving, what would infinite curvature look like (in a black hole)? (and WHY college textbooks for other than physics majors, keep referring to gravity as an attractive force???)

Time is 'real'? Please explain the delayed-choice physics experiment, then. The idea that the arrow of time goes only in one direction flies in the face of established physics and experimental data.

Time in absolute sense is non-existent. It is just an experiential reality that is assumed by an experiencer. If there is no experiencer, there is nothing like time. The brain tends to link up two points of actions (motions or processes) with its memory function. This associative experience is called time. The universe is perpetuity of motions or processes, chemical or otherwise.

Or else: imagine the beginning or end of so-called time billions and trillions of years before or after, but still the question remains: what was before or will be after? Saying that time started with big bang and ends with the end of the universe, is partial explanation. Big bang was rather a beginning of a series of processes/motions that would stop one day.

Time is an illusion, but a persistent one for any life form as such.


Wow, this looks like a lot of fun dude!


Declaring that multiverses are impossible is like declaring the world flat 500 years ago. I'm just a casual observer of these type of topics. But I've always thought black holes were the universes way of recycling material. If it's being recycled then maybe it's being reused elsewhere. Another universe would then make sense. But, again, I just think about these things for my personal entertainment.

Did anyone else stop reading after "fictional physicist"?

I really don't understand what this article is trying to state. It feels like the whole thing is trying to create an argument against its own title. While that might be a cute tactic in a high school session of debate, it's misleading to prospective readers. Furthermore, it feels like a huge wash of opinion with no direct quoting or siting of material, other than to say the source used a lot of big words. While writing this comment contributes to the end result, congratulations, nonetheless, on your success of wasting my time. I feel more enlightened by poster Bill's ad for a flatter belly.

Maskil asks:
You said "You can say that the plank constant is a variable over time and space, but when we want to build an bridge or a fusion reactor we're going to stick with our silly, provincial, non-new-book-publishing "actual physics." And that's the difference. Should "the plank constant" read "the Planck constant" or "Planck's constant"?"

No, Maskil, the plank constant is important because nobody wants to walk across a bridge built of inconstant planks. And don't even get me started on the dangers of a fusion reactor built from poor-quality wood!

This might be one of the worst articles I've ever read, Luke and the Daily Galaxy should both be embarrassed. I shall return to Digg and bury this at once.

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The fecund universes theory is interested, and it provokes one question: is our universe maximally adapted to create black holes (new universes). Basic evolutionary insight shows that it should. I think our universe is not (as far as we know now) thus adapted, and therefore the fecund universes theory should be regarded as unlikely. Of course, we don't know what most dark matter is, and what the future will bring (man-made black holes as a powersource?), but for observations now, the theory does not look very promising

I think the difference is that Smolin does not claim to know that his proposition is true - he fully admits that it is a speculation and currently unproved, whereas you deny that it could possibly be true with seeming absolute certainty. Hmmm.

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