God and the Theory of Everything

[Guest]

We live in exciting times. LHC detector channels at CERN are registering tantalizing glimpses of what is very likely the Higgs Boson (pretty much where theory says it should be).

With the mathematical reconciliation of string theory with quantum field theory having been achieved in a way that seamlessly transitions to, or is consistent with, special and general relativity at larger masses and dimensions, a credible, math and evidence backed, Theory of Everything is finally emerging.

As a former Mormon who has followed the quest for a Theory of Everything with great fascination, one question that I often ask myself as the new ideas and concepts emerge along the road is whether these new insights tend to strengthen or weaken the case for God.

By the time Galileo and Newton had finished their work of challenging religious dogma with fact, and showing that mathematics was the best way to describe and understand how the world worked, God was headed for the Gaps. And there he has pretty much remained while the gaps get smaller and smaller with each passing year.

The main Mormon mantra that we hear on this and other boards when it comes to science vs. religion goes something like this:

"Science (meaning scientists collectively) do not know or understand everything and I have faith that once science learns enough about how the world and the universe work, it will be clear that God is the creator and is in control."

Well, my dear religionist friends, we are just about there. Within the last few years, science has realized Einstein's dream of deriving a basic set of equations that could describe how the four basic forces (fields) in nature work and interact with one another.

Such a set of equations now exists. As with special and general relativity, it will take years to verify them by experiment and observation. Some of the things these equations describe will never be verified by direct observation. However, the math is there. It works well and is, in fact, surprisingly elegant.

The bad news for true believer religionists is that the closer we get to a Theory of Everything, the worse it looks for God and faith-based religion as the best way (or even a viable way) to describe how (or even why) the world and the universe work they do.

Recent observations have moved the size of the gaps wherein even the most speculative scientists will postulate that God might have "room to operate" to somewhere between 10 exp-35 and 10 exp-48 meters.

The math that affords us the Theory of Everything, that allows all four forces of nature, their interactions and quantized particles (gauge bosons) to be characterized and understood, can best be conceptualized in terms a universe with a boundary on which all information about the 3 dimensions objects within the universe is encoded.

In other words, according to the math, one way of thinking about this universe is that it is one of many (perhaps a large or infinite number) that are completely self-sufficient and operate absolutely and entirely according to natural law - no supernatural forces are, or can be, involved in their operation.

I would be interested to hear what apologists have to say about the status of belief in God if the Theory of Everything, as physicists are now coming to understand it, continues to hold with only minor modification and clarifications.

- What if humankind does succeeds in finally understanding the universe in which we live, and gains the capability to make high probability descriptions of the physics and environment in those universes in which we do not live?

- What if this understanding, which is now predictive of, and / or consistent with, all kinds of experiments and observations, continues to indicate that nothing is supernatural and there are really no Gaps into which God can retreat?

- Will faithful Mormons continue to make excuses for the blatently false and anti-science and counterfactual statements made by their leaders present and past?

- Will apologists continue to claim that secular or non-Christian (non-Mormon) humankind is ignorant and must depend on religion for the real answers, when secular humankind has a robust and working Theory of Everything that clearly works, and works well, without God or the supernatural?

___________

ETA: I am posting this in the Celestial Forum because I am interested in helping the apologists prepare for what will be a sea change in the strength and elegance of the science that they will be forced to contend with in the coming years.

[_Gadianton]

Hi Dr. W,

You are right to take a bit of pity on the apologists by posting your thoughts in the Celestial forum where news is delivered a little more gently.

I am not a scientist, but I love to watch documentaries about science and follow them up with a bit of blog or wiki reading. It's almost unfair that a layman such as myself of average intellect can learn about deep mysteries of the universe with so little effort. The most humble episode of NOVA reveals more truth than the sum total of every Mormon prophetic revelation ever uttered. This tends to anger the apologists as no matter how many degrees they obtain or how many books they read, they are left to interpret, reinterpret, and censor the men they have sustained as prophets, seers, and revelators. Their task is to salvage a shred of plausibility to the stream of conjecture and fabrication that has flowed from the pulpit of the tabernacle for more than a century and a half, and it's a near impossible task.

It surely angers these apologists who see themselves as elite, as highly educated and specially chosen vessels of gospel truth, that average folks with a basic public education are allowed to know so much more than the founders and leaders of their religion ever could have imagined.

When I was priest, during a lesson in priest's quorum, I was asked by the teacher how the sun got its light. I wasn't sure what he meant so I explained the basic process of fusion, and the Bishop chastised me for getting "off the wall." The correct answer was that Christ gave the light to the moon and to the sun. For them, this was the sensible, mature answer to the question and the fusion process was "out there", a fantasy of science. Now, the Bishop was not uneducated, he had a medical background and a successful career. But I'm here to tell you, no matter what the apologists say on these forums, when they get together in secret with their TBM peers, they'll disbelieve anything and everything they've learned in school if it supports the fairy tale Joseph Smith created for them.

[_Hades]

- Will faithful Mormons continue to make excuses for the blatently false and anti-science and counterfactual statements made by their leaders present and past?

- Will apologists continue to claim that secular or non-Christian (non-Mormon) humankind is ignorant and must depend on religion for the real answers, when secular humankind has a robust and working Theory of Everything that clearly works, and works well, without God or the supernatural?

Yes, for as long as they possibly can.

To you Gadianton, +1.

[_DrW]

Hi Dr. W,
The most humble episode of NOVA reveals more truth than the sum total of every Mormon prophetic revelation ever uttered.

How true. This pithy statement of fact will soon be in my signature line (with proper attribution, of course).

[_Aristotle Smith]

If you are going to discuss science and religion, I must insist you actually get the science correct.

We live in exciting times. LHC detector channels at CERN are registering tantalizing glimpses of what is very likely the Higgs Boson (pretty much where theory says it should be).

Yes, the LHC may discover the Higgs Boson, or it may not. In any case, I hate to deflate the buildup, but this will only fill in a small piece of the Standard Model. An important piece to be sure, but just a small piece. But, if they don't discover the Higgs Boson it really won't affect the Standard Model at all. The functions that the Higgs Boson is supposed to provide for the Standard Model will simply be pushed to different interactions, probably at higher energies than the LHC is capable of producing. In sum: If they discover the Higgs Boson, the Standard Model is safe. If they don't discover the Higgs Boson, the Standard Model is still safe. This is why I say it's a small piece, because it really has no power to falsify or prove anything. If it's there, then yes it is satisfying that the predicted energy levels for observing the Higgs were in the right ballpark.

With the mathematical reconciliation of string theory with quantum field theory having been achieved in a way that seamlessly transitions to, or is consistent with, special and general relativity at larger masses and dimensions, a credible, math and evidence backed, Theory of Everything is finally emerging.

String theory reconciles quantum field theory with general relativity, there is no reconciliation of string theory with quantum field theory, it is the reconciler, not an object of reconciliation. And, to be precise you are dealing with string theories, not a single string theory. To make matters worse, you aren't just dealing with a couple of string theories, the number of possible string theories on offer is quite staggering.

But even more problematic is your assertion that this is "evidence backed." As far as I know there is not a single experimental or observational verification of any predictions of any string theory, other than the the fact that QFT and General Relativity are experimentally verified and at lower energies, string theory reduces to QFT and General Relativity. Even worse, I know of no prospect in the near future for any possible experimental verification of string theory, the energies needed are simply too great. For a good account of this see Lee Smolin's "The Trouble with Physics."

As a former Mormon who has followed the quest for a Theory of Everything with great fascination, one question that I often ask myself as the new ideas and concepts emerge along the road is whether these new insights tend to strengthen or weaken the case for God.

As a former Mormon and current Christian I think this has absolutely nothing to do with strengthening or weakening any case for the existence of God. Sure if one's belief in God and reading of scripture is reductive, a-historical, fundamentalistic, and puerile, then sure, it will affect one's belief in God. Otherwise, it really doesn't affect it one way or the other.

The bad news for true believer religionists is that the closer we get to a Theory of Everything, the worse it looks for God and faith-based religion as the best way (or even a viable way) to describe how (or even why) the world and the universe work they do.

If you start with the assumption that the basic purpose of scripture is to communicate science, which you seem to do, then I guess this whole thing does affect your belief. If you don't see it in those terms, then God isn't hiding in the gaps and science is a wonderful tool for explaining the empirical universe, but that simply isn't the whole story to everything.

[Guest]

If you are going to discuss science and religion, I must insist you actually get the science correct.

We live in exciting times. LHC detector channels at CERN are registering tantalizing glimpses of what is very likely the Higgs Boson (pretty much where theory says it should be).

Yes, the LHC may discover the Higgs Boson, or it may not. In any case, I hate to deflate the buildup, but this will only fill in a small piece of the Standard Model. An important piece to be sure, but just a small piece. But, if they don't discover the Higgs Boson it really won't affect the Standard Model at all. The functions that the Higgs Boson is supposed to provide for the Standard Model will simply be pushed to different interactions, probably at higher energies than the LHC is capable of producing. In sum: If they discover the Higgs Boson, the Standard Model is safe. If they don't discover the Higgs Boson, the Standard Model is still safe. This is why I say it's a small piece, because it really has no power to falsify or prove anything. If it's there, then yes it is satisfying that the predicted energy levels for observing the Higgs were in the right ballpark.

With the mathematical reconciliation of string theory with quantum field theory having been achieved in a way that seamlessly transitions to, or is consistent with, special and general relativity at larger masses and dimensions, a credible, math and evidence backed, Theory of Everything is finally emerging.

String theory reconciles quantum field theory with general relativity, there is no reconciliation of string theory with quantum field theory, it is the reconciler, not an object of reconciliation. And, to be precise you are dealing with string theories, not a single string theory. To make matters worse, you aren't just dealing with a couple of string theories, the number of possible string theories on offer is quite staggering.

But even more problematic is your assertion that this is "evidence backed." As far as I know there is not a single experimental or observational verification of any predictions of any string theory, other than the the fact that QFT and General Relativity are experimentally verified and at lower energies, string theory reduces to QFT and General Relativity. Even worse, I know of no prospect in the near future for any possible experimental verification of string theory, the energies needed are simply too great. For a good account of this see Lee Smolin's "The Trouble with Physics."

As a former Mormon who has followed the quest for a Theory of Everything with great fascination, one question that I often ask myself as the new ideas and concepts emerge along the road is whether these new insights tend to strengthen or weaken the case for God.

As a former Mormon and current Christian I think this has absolutely nothing to do with strengthening or weakening any case for the existence of God. Sure if one's belief in God and reading of scripture is reductive, a-historical, fundamentalistic, and puerile, then sure, it will affect one's belief in God. Otherwise, it really doesn't affect it one way or the other.

The bad news for true believer religionists is that the closer we get to a Theory of Everything, the worse it looks for God and faith-based religion as the best way (or even a viable way) to describe how (or even why) the world and the universe work they do.

If you start with the assumption that the basic purpose of scripture is to communicate science, which you seem to do, then I guess this whole thing does affect your belief. If you don't see it in those terms, then God isn't hiding in the gaps and science is a wonderful tool for explaining the empirical universe, but that simply isn't the whole story to everything.

Aristotle,

Pretty sure that you are incorrect when you claim that there is no reconciliation between quantum field theory and relativity that is made possible via the (mathematics of) string theory.
_______________________________

ETA: Please see post below.

[_DrW]

Aristotle,

A quick set-up for the statement is as follows: at arbitrarily small distances (e.g. point particle distances) quantum mechanical "jitters" in the gravitational field can be arbitrarily large. With the point particle assumptions that are normally made in quantum field theory, it is difficult (not practical) to include the effects of gravity (from general relativity) on quantum mechanical processes, so gravity is normally ignored (with little or no adverse effect on the outcomes of the calculations, provided that one re-normalizes).

String theory does away with the point particle problem (by replacing points with vibrating strings of more than zero length). Since the strings have some extent in space, there is a limit on how small of a volume or space can be probed with strings. The reduction in the relative magnitude of the quantum jitters of the local gravitational field, because of the increase in the minimum (volume) interval of (9-) space that can be probed by the strings, as compared to a point, is sufficient to allow the math to be done.

On Page 366 (in note # 8) of his new book on the Theory of Everything entitled "The Hidden Reality Parallel Universes and Deep Laws of the Cosmos" well known string theorist Brian Greene makes the following statement:

"This limit proves sufficient to tame the unruly mathematics allowing string theory to merge quantum mechanics and general relativity."

While I recognize that this could be considered as a special case, I would also point out that physics at this scale has been where the problems between quantum field theory and general relativity have been the most obvious. At larger dimensional scales, and higher speeds and masses, one can simply use general relativity and not worry about quantum field theory all that much (even though if it were possible to do the math, there is no reason to believe that one would not come up with the same answer).

So, while it might have been more accurate to state that string theory can reconcile quantum field theory and general relativity at small scales (e.g. on the order of the Planck distance), I will stand by my statement as perfectly reasonable for a Mormon Discussions message board.

Also appropriate for a Mormon Discussion board is the reference to "string theory", since the various string theories out there have been shown to be essentially equivalent when considered in 9 spatial dimensions and one time dimension.

With regard to the evidence part, well, it is now after midnight here and I have to work tomorrow, so that really will have to wait. Thanks for reading the OP and for your comments.

[_Aristotle Smith]

Pretty sure that you are incorrect when you claim that there is no reconciliation between quantum field theory and relativity that is made possible via the (mathematics of) string theory.

I am correct, you originally wrote:

With the mathematical reconciliation of string theory with quantum field theory having been achieved

Now later on in the sentence you do mention relativity:

in a way that seamlessly transitions to, or is consistent with, special and general relativity at larger masses and dimensions

You can argue that it was just awkward sentence construction and that you really knew what you were talking about; that's reasonable and I've done something like that several times myself. But the original sentence says "reconciliation of string theory with quantum field theory." It does not say "reconciliation of QFT and GR with string theory," which is a clearer statement of what is happening.

[_Aristotle Smith]

Also appropriate for a Mormon Discussion board is the reference to "string theory", since the various string theories out there have been shown to be essentially equivalent when considered in 9 spatial dimensions and one time dimension.

Please see the Wikipedia article on the number of string theories:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superstrin ... g_theories

From said article:

Please note that the number of superstring theories given above is only a high-level classification; the actual number of mathematically distinct theories which are compatible with observation and would therefore have to be examined to find the one that correctly describes nature is currently believed to be at least 10^500 (a one with five hundred zeroes). This has given rise to the concern that superstring theories, despite the alluring simplicity of their basic principles, are, in fact, not simple at all, and according to the principle of Occam's razor perhaps alternative physical theories going beyond the Standard Model should be explored. This is aggravated by the fact that it is exceedingly hard to make predictions from any superstring theory which can be falsified by experiment, and in fact no current superstring theory makes any falsifiable prediction.

I believe Brian Greene makes a similar statement in his book The Elegant Universe, but I'm just too lazy and busy to look it up now.

[_Buffalo]

Hi Dr. W,
The most humble episode of NOVA reveals more truth than the sum total of every Mormon prophetic revelation ever uttered.

How true. This pithy statement of fact will soon be in my signature line (with proper attribution, of course).

That is a great quote. If we had more room in sigs I'd quote it too.