Re: [asa] Loop quantum gravity

Interesting in that this sorta jibes with the Jewish notion of God
creating by "organizing" something out of existing chaos, concurrent
with assigning function and name to the creation. That would certainly
allow for a pre-BB existence in some form. Post Big Bang, the E side of
the E=mc^2 equation is to us the preexisting state with respect to the
later mixed E and m states. The question seems to be whether we can
create a model that projects some insight into the pre-BB domain
(assuming it "exists", whatever that means), given that we do not seem
to have access to it. JimA

Randy Isaac wrote:

> In addition to the book that George cited, Lee Smolin wrote a good
> summary article of loop quantum gravity in the January 2004 issue of
> Scientific American. Recently there was a special issue of Sci Am in
> April 2006 on the topic of time in which Smolin had another article.
> http://www.sciam.com/special/toc.cfm?issueid=40&sc=rt_nav_list
> <http://www.sciam.com/special/toc.cfm?issueid=40&sc=rt_nav_list> In
> that issue is another intriguing article that I haven't read yet. The
> index states: "The Myth of the Beginning of Time" by Gabriele
> Veneziano. "String theory suggests that the big bang was not the
> origin of the universe but simply the outcome of a preexisting state."
>
> I would tend to agree with all the comments made so far but would also
> add that any contribution to metaphysical concepts (theism is too
> strong) would come primarily from its replacement of string theory.
> That is, the buzz in the science community is all about string theory,
> supersymmetry, M theory, multiverses, branes, and all those
> multi-dimensional perspectives that lead some folks to make
> metaphysical extrapolations. Loop quantum gravity is the alternative
> to string theory. If it is true, it would undo much of that speculation.
>
> I'm a long way from understanding this theory and the oversimplified
> way in which I can begin to grasp it is that it starts from the
> assumption that space and time are quantized. In a simple-minded way,
> it seems to be "quantization of space and time" vs "dimensions beyond
> 3+1 space+time".
>
> Randy
>
>
> David Opderbeck wrote:
>
>> Is anyone familiar with this theory? What implications does it have
>> for theism?
>
>
>
>

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Received on Thu Nov 9 23:55:44 2006