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The Full Circle of Quantum Cosmology

It appears that particle physicists and cosmologists are a cranky lot.  The longer they go on the more weird their speculations become.  A lot of the weirdness has to do with shuffling away from the Big Bang--which is uncomfortably close to the biblical doctrine of creation.  

Stephen Hawking and his collaborators have said no, no, no to the C word and speculatively cast about for an alternative explanation.  David Berlinski aptly puts Hawking's explanation for the origin of the universe, or the cause of the Universe, in the form of a religious catechism:

A Catechism of Quantum Cosmology

Q: From what did our universe evolve?
A: Our universe evolved from a much smaller, much emptier mini-universe.  You may think of it as an egg.


Q: What was the smaller, emptier universe like?
A: It was a four-dimensional sphere with nothing much inside it.  You may think of that as weird.

Q: How can a sphere have four dimensions?
A: A sphere can have four dimensions if it has one more dimension than a three-dimensional sphere.  You may think of that as obvious. 

Q: Does the smaller, emptier universe have a name?

A: The smaller, emptier universe is called a de Sitter universe.  You may think of that as about time someone paid attention to de Sitter.


Q: Is there anything else I should know about the smaller, emptier universe?
A: Yes.  It represents a solution to Einstein's field equations.  You may think of that as a good thing.


Q: Where was that smaller, emptier universe or egg?
A: It was in the place where space as we know it did not exist.  You may think of it as a sac.


Q: When was it there?
A: It was there at a time when time as know it did not exist.  You may think of it as a mystery.


Q: Where did the egg come from?
A: The egg did not actually come from anywhere.  You may think of this as astonishing.


Q: If the egg did not come from anywhere, how did it get there?
A: The egg got there because the wave function of the universe said it was probable.  You may think of this as a done deal.


Q: How did our universe evolve from the egg?
A: It evolved by inflating itself up from its sac to become the universe in which we now find ourselves.  You may think of it as just one of those things. 


This catechism, I should add, is not a parody of quantum cosmology.  It is quantum cosmology.  [David Berlinski, The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions (New York: Basic Books, 2009), p. 104-6.]

The above catechism exposes the "just so" nature of the secular cosmologists.  These things that "explain" the existence of the universe via the beginning of the Big Bang are true and believable because the cosmologist says they are.  We are to think of it as a "done deal".  Hawking has conjured up a grand cluster of assumptions which he has then gone on to assume are true.  Once you do that, then, as Berlinski says: "The result is guaranteed--one hunnerd percent, as used car-salesmen say."

We are now getting close to the speculative creation myths of a more pagan and primitive and ignorant past.   We are in the realm of philosophical metaphysics.  Berlinski rightly skewers it when he says:

Quantum cosmology is a branch of mathematical metaphysics.  It provided no cause for the emergence of the universe, and so does not answer the first cosmological question, and it offers no reason for the existence of the universe, and so does not address the second.  If the mystification induced by its modest mathematics were removed from the subject, what remains would not appear appreciably different in kind from various creation myths in which the origin of the universe is attributed to sexual congress between primordial deities.  [Ibid., p.107f.]

Hawking and his colleagues are casting themselves more and more after the mould of Pythagoras and his mystical mathematical speculations.  For Pythagoras and his disciples, these speculations rapidly morphed into a false religion.  The Quantum Cosmologists are well down that track.