Pope Francis Passes: Carl Sagan; 'The Demon Haunted World', Misc Cosmology/Scopes Trial

 One probably should read science, philosophy and history for-oneself. If so one may learn about the tenuous grasp on existence humanity faces today with numerous self-generated challenges that may end human anytime. The future has dystopian vectors proliferating. Hard science fiction today tends to run behind the pace of actual science. If one mentions spirit and the paradigm of the existence of the cosmology of the Universe as a sort of virtual field, the establishment narrative vociferously defends their worldly turf as if in reaction to salt touching a slug.. It is like the parable of the crabpots were crabs could not escape because other crabs pulled them down as they tried to climb out of the trap. Tegmark's 'The Mathematical Universe' was just one non-standard approach to cosmological investigation- there are numerous others.

I read some of Sagan's works like Dragon's of Eden and have a fairly good idea of his public information having lived through that era. Democrats prefer ad hominems and straw men. You may regard a two-dimensional universe as silly and uninformed, yet it is a real scientific idea. Here is a paper from 2009 in Physics Letters B https://www.sciencedirect.com/…/pii/S0370269309009204

 My casual reference to a quantum cosmology paradigm that is fairly well known seemed scientifically uneducated to some. Well at least google AI knows about it- a consolation for me if you have a bad opinion… "The idea of two dimensions underlying the entangled universe suggests that quantum entanglement, a phenomenon where two or more particles become linked in such a way that they share the same fate, might be connected to the existence of extra dimensions beyond our 3 spatial dimensions and time. This connection proposes that entanglement could be a manifestation of interactions happening in higher dimensions, perhaps even acting as a form of "geometric glue" holding spacetime together, according to some theoretical models. "

Sagan didn't prove anything in philosophy or theology to support his appearance of atheism (he may have been an agnostic). Unfortunately he is regarded as a media forerunner of Lawrence Krauss and Richard Dawkins; scientist that have taken Sagan's 'I have no proof for the God hypothesis' to a public atheist militant posture.. I didn't write anything about theologians or philosophers being dilettantes. I have read a lot of philosophy and theology and would not be so inclined. Perhaps you don't know the definition- "a person who cultivates an area of interest, such as the arts, without real commitment or knowledge". Sagan's science was solid enough. Scientific knowledge really does not encompass philosophy, theology and metaphysics. It seems to me unscientific to use science as a support for faith in atheism.

I read all of those cosmology books like Weinberg's (an atheist) 'The First Three Minutes' etc back in the day. John Barrow's 'The Book of Universes' was interesting, as was Tegmark's 'The Mathematical Universe' and several others that I read. Watson and Crick were fairly new when I was a kid as were Penzias and WilsonIf Fred Hoyle and his static Universe hypothesis still was an acceptable alternative minority theory. If scientists stick with science their work is credible. There are several that write popular books on cosmology and physics that I like and other such as those by Sean Carrol that toss in a few gratuitous shots at people of faith like Ken Follet would toss in a gratuitous sloppy sex scene in his otherwise good reading fiction books.

A lot of people are ill-informed about the Bible, including people identifying as Christians, much less scientists. It takes a lot of time to be well read in various disciplines and people are specialists and mostly unaware of depth content in other fields. Someone could program an AI to interrogate specialist in science and other fields to ask Socratic questions of them to demonstrate their ignorance. There is real depth in theology, the Bible and especially the paradigm of God that people are often dismissive of as if it were part of 'the demon haunted world'. 

Clarence Darrow and the Scopes trial, Charles Darwin and the monkey trial paradigm was an excuse for many to dismiss faith in God. Knowledge however increased in the field of Christianity as well as in science. The Bible was ever independent of the people that made hermeneutics from it. George LeMaitre was a Belgian priest, Gregory Mendel an Augustinian friar. If God were evolving the Universe, or shaped it in stages with his thought, who would know in the scientific community today?

On this day where notice of Pope Francis dying was made, and I am not Catholic, I will say I don't believe Carl Sagan is a demon haunting the world. I have made an effort to explain some of the paradigm I mentioned above in a few free ebooks. https://www.lulu.com/shop/garrison-c-gibson/christianity-evolution-and-digital-universes/ebook/product-wnddgd.html?page=1&pageSize=4

Regarding time warps- there is actually a theory that time does not exist as it is presented in the unified space-time paradigm of General Relativity. A woman physicist published a paper recently on time being generated as a phenomena of quantum entanglement. I am not too well read on the concept right now. I did go over related ideas about faster than light travel in other ways than the GR paradigm for wormholes in an essay post I made a while ago. I will post that below. I read an interesting book a few years ago named ‘Faster Than the Speed of Light’ by Dr. Joao Magueijo- he speculated that the speed of light may be variable.

The wormhole idea may have started with Einstein and Rosen (ER) critiquing quantum mechanics; they regarded it as an incomplete theory.. They believed that quantum entanglement could hypothetically be explained by a wormhole between entangled quantum particles. Plainly that opens the way to fiction paradigms for star trek transporters sending people through shaped quantum wormholes.

A modern theory that may surpass the Lamda Cold Dark Matter CDM model is one that has space-time and all of the contingent-entangled Universe being comparable to an illusion that occurs on or from an underlying timeless realm. Today some believe it could be explained by the four-dimensional universe being somewhat like a physical projection or phenomenon from an underlying two-dimensional field. That is the Universe of four dimensions is comparable to an illusion or phenomenon made because the field fluctuations of the two dimensional field yield waves that become entangled at points as particles and so the extra dimensions exist in the entangled state. The new criterion would allow star-trek style transporters to relocate travelers anyplace in the Universe instantly. In a sense they would exploit quantum entanglement to disentangle themselves from local spacetime and reappear in another. More about that below.

ER=EPR stimulated, as I understand it, further ideas about wormholes between black holes and white holes. I hate to think about the way time is affected between the black hole and white holes in the wormholes. Some opinion based on ER is that the black white hole vector is the only form that wormholes could exist in space-time. One need put an asterisk next to many “only place” ideas obviously for they are difficult to prove.

There are other theories today about gravity and black holes instead of quantum gravity theories. One is that singularities don’t really exist in black holes and instead they stop reducing at a certain size and spew out their mass through the wormhole and white hole on the other end.

Quantum entropy is a new explanation for gravity that obviously isn’t proven yet. Yet it could provide another opportunity for faster-than-light-travel theory. One should be able to use a star trek transporter to reduce an individual to an unentangled state and bounce the information down to the timeless two-dimensional place that uplifts the contingent universe of four dimensions. Space-time in that timeless two-dimensional realm is quite different (no time and no distance in comparison to the four dimension realm). Then one need return the disentangled quanta to a different location in the Universe.

Here is some information about quantum entropy gravity theory summarized by Gemini-

“The "quantum entropy theory of gravity" is a framework that proposes that gravity can be derived from quantum relative entropy, a measure of how different two quantum states are. This approach attempts to unify quantum mechanics and general relativity by treating gravity as an emergent phenomenon arising from the differences in information content between spacetime and matter.

Entropy and Gravity:

The core idea is that gravity isn't a fundamental force but rather a consequence of the increasing disorder (entropy) within a system. In this framework, the geometry of spacetime is related to a quantum operator, and the difference between the natural spacetime metric and the metric induced by matter fields is quantified by quantum relative entropy.

Bridging Quantum and General Relativity:

By linking gravity to quantum information, this theory aims to reconcile the two seemingly incompatible theories of quantum mechanics and general relativity.

Modified Einstein Equations:

The entropic action leads to modified Einstein equations that, under certain conditions, reduce to the familiar equations of general relativity. However, it also predicts a small, positive cosmological constant, which aligns better with the observed accelerated expansion of the universe than other existing theories.

The G-field:

The theory introduces a G-field, an auxiliary field acting as a Lagrangian multiplier, which plays a crucial role in the modified gravity equations and potentially offers new insights into dark matter.

Emergent Gravity:

This approach suggests that gravity might be an emergent phenomenon, meaning it arises from the collective behavior of smaller, more fundamental constituents of spacetime.”

On Select Futurism Sources for Science Fiction Writers

Not a fan of Sagan. His atheist outlook was very unscientific and unphilosophical, and that was too bad for he was a decent scientist. Scientists that are dilettantes in philosophy and theology simply cap intelligent thought in spiritual fields. The excellence in science deludes them into believing they know everything and condescension arises to the masses.  People like Leibnitz didn’t do that in the past. He was an inventor of calculus, mathematical logic and one-dimensional spiritual monads.

This morning I watched a video extolling the realm of James Webb discoveries that said the universe is evolving to realize itself through human consciousness. That was an adaptation of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Mind- ‘God evolving to realize himself through history’. Nothing like the timeless classic philosophers from Thales, Socrates, Plotinus and Anaximander to Democritus, Heraclitus and Parmenides for futurism.

Good sources of futurism are physics publications. The discoveries and theories about the Universe-there are numerous ones; allow for informed metaphysical extrapolation of technologies to travel faster than light for example, reflecting ideas about an holographic universe, a universe with two-dimension underpinnings supporting the third-dimension quantum entanglement that seems to be a real Universe physically via the Higgs field.

It seems apparent that a two-dimension field with ripples of waveforms in it could have wave crests entangled as prominences from the fields. It could be about anything from the word of God having spoken into darkness to a reflection from a distant drummer banging the gong with sound waves.

I liked Toffler’s Future Shock in 1972 yet the problem of two many choices he presented was solved by a mass economic slump following the end of the Vietnam war rather than a promiscuity settled by monogamy and a woman ruling the home with an iron rod.

Harlan Ellison’s classic ‘I have No mouth and Must Scream’ comes to mind when I take generative AI courses on-line at courser.org. Taking environmental adaptation and economic courses at courser.org also allow hard scientific formulations for environmental economic plans in addition to dystopias. There is another course there that describes inventing one’s own planet atmosphere in a solar system given understanding of atmospheric greenhousing, distance from a star etc. Robert Heinlein was a naval academy graduate so he understood weapons fairly well and could extrapolate from that. One can use YouTube for all sorts of ideas about making new weapons to destroy worlds…great stuff for hard Sci-Fi though not such a good trend for the survival of human life.

The Resurrection of Jesus; Late Saturday Before Dusk?

 Easter Sunday is celebrated as the day of Jesus' resurrection and rightly so; it is a practical unifying moment. Yet in fact the Lord may have been resurrected just before dusk on Saturday. Interestingly he may have been crucified on a Wednesday instead of a Friday. The video below explains the timeline persuasively.

 To summarize; the day after Passover was a Jewish 'High Day' and an annual sabbath. Therefore there was the week of Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection, two sabbath days. He was actually in the tomb three full days and nights fulfilling his statement that the evil generation would be given no signs except for that of Jonah where the man was three full days and nights incarcerated in a whale.

https://youtu.be/EmtyYqq11Qc?si=_bJQ8zp4EhPhuoHz

A Try at Explaining Why a Universe Rotating in Absolute Nothingness Wouldn't Have a Pervasive Centripetal Force To Make the Universe Expand

 I will make another try at justifying the point that a uniformally rotating universe ought not experience centripetal force that would be able to replace dark energy for expanding space unless space-time of the Universe is embedded within something else (i.e. aether) and/or it has an axis point that exists in space-time at the same relative location or the rotation exists within space-time of the Universe anisotoprically and isn’t present at 100% of the space-time Universe.

“From the rider’s perspective, they feel a force pushing them outward, seemingly away from the center of the merry-go-round. This is a perceived force due to the observer’s frame of reference (the rotating merry-go-round), not an actual force acting on the rider.”-google search 

“According to Newton’s first law of motion, it is the natural tendency of all moving objects to continue in motion in the same direction that they are moving … unless some form of unbalanced force acts upon the object to deviate its motion from its straight-line path. Moving objects will tend to naturally travel in straight lines; an unbalanced force is only required to cause it to turn. Thus, the presence of an unbalanced force is required for objects to move in circles.” –Quote from ‘The Physics Classroom’

I like special relativity as an explanation of the criterion; special relativity would have the internal state/speed of a moving train being motionless to an observe seated on the train with the windows closed and the train itself moving only in relation to something else such as the ground below it (or the ground moving below the train). I believe the same principle would apply to an object such as a sphere, circle or wireframe square slowly rotating in the midst of nothingness; internally nothing is changing position, and neither is it externally changing position. A merry-go-round always has external forces acting on it and has real matter beyond it. If the pivot point of the merry go round was changing too at the same speed as the perimeter and there seemed to be no apparent motion to an observer in the Universe or merry go round I don’t see where a centripetal ‘force’ would arise.

Considering the idea of it having an axis, and rotating once every half trillion years- shouldn't the perimeter move faster than light at a certain point? https://www.livescience.com/.../universe-may-revolve-once...

A Theory Suggests the Universe Slowly Spins to Explain Hubble Tension

 It is philosophically interesting because of the problems of motion and the void. Modern physics and cosmology don’t acknowledge anything besides space-time and the physics of it. Yet in order to have the Universe rotating it need be in some volume or void with something beyond its edge. The intuitive idea of a primordial empty space holding material fields that appear to be space-time seems a pragmatic inference.

One body or universe cannot be said to ‘rotate’ unless in relation to something else. Even if it were in a true void, space-time would need to be said to rotate in relation to something more than nothing. If the two-dimensional fields emanating a third dimensions entanglement scenario were located on the event horizon of a spinning black hole, as some have suggested, perhaps the math could be worked out.

Obviously there may be some other explanation for the expansion of a two-dimensional ‘bubble’ of curvature within which a true void persisted even as a third dimension of entanglement occurred. Curvature with time added may appear to be rotation from some points of view. There is also the problem of the general relativity of a virtual, contingent three dimensional Universe of entanglement engaged via mass quantum entanglement and super-position naturally with a timeless two-dimensional substrate.

Interesting problems for philosophical thought- especially with the other new theory that time is a local phenomenon created by the relationship of quantum entanglement and super-position. Evidently the more quantum particles are entangled as at a black hole the more time is produced; no time in massless two-dimensional particles and vast amounts of time in black holes- unless black holes convert all of that quantum entanglement into passages to other parts of the Universe of space-time and white holes.

https://studyfinds.org/is-the-universe-spinning/

I looked into the matter. It’s not what is ‘in’ the Universe; rather it is what the Universe is contained in (such as an empty volume of nothing). It’s rotation could only be within itself and its own reference internally rather in relation to nothing outside. Apparently a Machian point of view with the rotation caused by internal forces and nothing else besides the Universe exist would be negated if the Universe were within a void of nothingness. In that case there might be no internal changes with the rotation 9at least if there was no central axis. If one modifies Newton’s spinning bucket experiment of a bucket spun at the end of a rope in absolute space of nothingness, and the bucket walls have no friction, this is what gemini said;

That’s an excellent modification to the thought experiment, highlighting the crucial role of friction (or viscosity in the case of a fluid).

If the bucket was absolutely without friction between its walls/base and the water:

Bucket Rotation: The rope spins the bucket, causing the bucket itself to rotate and move in a circular path through absolute space.

No Torque Transfer: Because there is absolutely no friction, the rotating walls of the bucket cannot exert any tangential force (torque) on the water. The walls simply slide past the water molecules they are in contact with.

Water’s Inertia (Rotational): The water, due to its inertia, will resist any change in its rotational state. Since no torque is applied to it by the frictionless bucket, the bulk of the water will not start rotating relative to absolute space (or its initial inertial frame). It remains rotationally static.

Water’s Motion (Translational): However, the water is contained within the bucket. As the bucket is forced by the rope to move in a circle, the physical boundary of the bucket will force the water as a whole to follow that same circular path through space. The bucket essentially pushes the water along this path. So, the water is accelerating centripetally (constantly changing direction). This centripetal force is provided by the pressure from the bucket walls pushing inward on the water mass.

Water Surface Shape: Since the water itself is not rotating (even though its center of mass is orbiting), there is no centrifugal effect within the water pushing it outwards towards the walls. The pressure distribution within the water remains uniform horizontally.—I asked Gemini about the Universe- it like your perspective… “If a universe was rotating in absolute space of nothingness, would anything internally change as a result of its rotation (there is no gravity or fields in nothingness of absolute space).

Show thinking

This is a fascinating question that delves into the very nature of space, motion, and inertia, touching on ideas from Newton, Mach, and Einstein. The answer depends significantly on which physical framework you adopt:

Newtonian View (Absolute Space):

Newton believed in “absolute space,” a fixed, immovable background stage against which all motion occurred. Rotation relative to this absolute space was “absolute rotation.”

In this view, if the entire universe (all its matter and energy) were rotating relative to this absolute space, then observers and objects within that universe would be in a non-inertial (rotating) frame of reference.

Yes, internal changes/effects would be observable.

Centrifugal Effects: Objects would experience an apparent outward force away from the axis of rotation. This could, for example, cause the large-scale structure of the universe to flatten into a disc over time, similar to how the spinning Earth bulges at the equator.

Coriolis Effects: Objects moving within the universe would be deflected from straight paths (as viewed from within the rotating frame). This affects weather patterns on Earth, for instance.

Sagnac Effect: Light travelling in opposite directions around a closed loop would take different amounts of time to complete the circuit, an effect measurable internally.

Essentially, according to Newton, the universe would “know” it’s rotating because physics behaves differently in a rotating frame compared to a non-rotating (inertial) one, irrespective of external reference points. Newton’s bucket experiment aimed to demonstrate this – the concave water indicates rotation relative to absolute space.

Machian View (Relationalism):

Ernst Mach disagreed with absolute space. He proposed (in what’s now called Mach’s Principle) that inertia itself (an object’s resistance to acceleration) arises from the object’s relationship or interaction with all other matter in the universe. Motion, including rotation, is only meaningful relative to other matter.

In this view, asking if the entire universe is rotating relative to absolute nothingness is potentially meaningless. If everything is rotating together, what is it rotating relative to?

Likely no, internal changes would not occur or the question is ill-posed. If inertia depends on the distribution of distant matter, and that entire distribution is rotating “as one,” there might be no internal reference frame against which to detect this rotation. The laws of physics inside would be the same as if it weren’t rotating.

Einstein’s General Relativity (GR):

GR replaces absolute space with dynamic spacetime, whose geometry is shaped by mass and energy. It incorporates some Machian ideas (like frame-dragging, where rotating masses drag spacetime) but doesn’t fully realize Mach’s Principle. Local inertial frames (where physics looks simplest, without fictitious forces) are determined by the local spacetime geometry, which is influenced by the overall distribution of mass-energy.

GR does allow for solutions representing rotating universes (like the Gödel Universe).

Yes, internal changes/effects would likely occur. In such models, the rotation affects the geometry of spacetime itself.

Observers would be able to perform local experiments (like using gyroscopes or observing light paths) to determine that they are in a globally rotating spacetime.

Frame-dragging would be a global effect.

The definition of a “non-rotating” frame locally would be tied to the rotating cosmic matter itself.

Conclusion:

Based on our current understanding of physics (leaning towards GR and the local validity of Newtonian concepts in weak fields/low speeds), if a universe containing matter and energy were rotating as a whole relative to some defined external standard (or if its own mass-energy distribution defined a state of overall rotation):

Yes, there would be internally observable consequences. Observers and experiments within that universe could detect this rotation through effects like centrifugal and Coriolis forces, the Sagnac effect, and potentially large-scale structural alignments or distortions caused by these effects over cosmic time. The universe wouldn’t need an external reference point to “know” it’s rotating; the physical laws operating within it would manifest differently compared to a non-rotating universe.” 

 I wonder if the entire Universe were rotating at the same speed, instead of around an internal axis of rotation, if that would make a difference. I think it interesting to consider the Universe as having an axis of rotation in space-time; the original spin before or after an inflaton, and how it would be effected by special relativity over time in regard to location in space-time history.

Future Format Adaptations of the Novel.

 I prefer e-books over paper since I can read them in the dark and take a library with me in a pocket among other reason. Audio books are good. I suppose AI live streams reading books to 'readers and adjusting interactively as the 'reader' tells it to; for example, to slow down or speed up, answer questions about the book, talk about it etc. 

Perhaps 'readers; will be able to interact with books and talk to characters as the story evolves as if they were participating in the narrative. Eventually that would develop into video books that are live and develop on the foundation of an author's plot and writing yet that become completely malleable for the AI to synergize and adapt for a reader's individual amusement- differing for each reader. The market will attract authors toward producing books formats that byers find most the entertaining.

https://suno.com/song/7d021376-da12-4997-a737-736a0ac906c5?sh=m31a19OPdPnhEVTN

On another topic. If its true that micro-plastics are in every American brain to the amount of seven plastic bottle caps worth it can't be worth being concerned about NPR support for the Democrat Party disappearing. It went downhill even before Bob Edwards was fired. NPR might have been trying to create woke plastic hippies.

Tariffs Seem to be a Way of Taxing Foreign Corporations

 Large U.S. corporations already pay zero net taxes and foreign corporations less than 5%. Tariffs might be considered to be a way to tax foreign corporations a fair share. U.S. taxes might be increased on those earning more than $250K, yet they should be eliminated for the poor, and the poor should be given a positive $10,000 earned income credit. Taxes on the middle class should be reduced to a flat 5% rate.