Stephen Hawking: God didn't create universe

[MontuckyFried]

Generalize much?

Seriously. There are religious zealots. There are scientific zealots. There are political and all sorts of other ideological zealots. Thus are the realities of human nature.

[XXX-er]

Most women die single.

thats cuz most men die earlier cuz they are trying to get away from their wives

we always made this joke about our parents and had a chuckle

[skaredshtles]

Seems like a good time to put up this Venn diagram.

[GeezerSteve]

Generalize much?

My comment was based on my personal experience over several decades. Note the qualifiers "most" and [those] "I know." See how that works?

Sure, I've met very religious people who are kind and humble -- I never suggested otherwise. But most them are certain that their beliefs are valid and true, notwithstanding a lack of evidence to support them.

[Elkhound Odin]

Seems like a good time to put up this Venn diagram.

I knew Scientology was a good foundation, but this proves it has all the answers.

[SumJongGuy]

The Venn diagram needs "Conversion Therapy" added to it... or is it there and I missed it??

[hatchgreenchile]

My comment was based on my personal experience over several decades. Note the qualifiers "most" and [those] "I know." See how that works?

Sure, I've met very religious people who are kind and humble -- I never suggested otherwise. But most them are certain that their beliefs are valid and true, notwithstanding a lack of evidence to support them.

Very interesting indeed, as my experience is the opposite. The people of faith I've come across, outside of a few ultra conservative or holier than thou assholes, are generally "good people".

[I've seen black diamonds!]

A great irony is science shows people of faith generally live longer, happier lives.

Part of me envies entrenched faith. Makes many things much simpler and much easier.

It also shows that people who are depressed are more likely to be correct. I think these two observations are two sides of the same equation.

[summit]

Well, I admit I am no theoretical physicist. That's for sure. I don't think any of us dentists are. No need to be on our armchair scientist high horses. My degree had to do with business management, not science. For some reason though, peeps on the interwebz like to elevate themselves to the thinking levels of Hawking et al. After all, we DID watch that one episode of Cosmos and follow NDGT on Twitter, so we must know all, right?!

Dude... nobody here is doing math 11 dimensional tensors. That is Hawking level thinking.

But it is not asking much for you to try and understand the most basic conceptual definitions of the topic you are judging: scientific hypothesis vs scientific theory.

That might seem harsh, but it is because I think you are smart but being intellectually lazy here and you are better than that (take that as a compliment).

[summit]

At times, yes. How about Einstein's idea of a static universe? (he later accepted the expanding universe model) Where was his evidence to begin with? There are loads of examples throughout history of physicists observing (or completely theorizing) a natural phenomenon, and shoving a formula in there to make it work. Sometime's they're spot on as far as we know. Sometimes they are WAYYYYY off base.

I had to address this. So here was a case where the original theoretical physics (maths) predicted something that hadn't been observed, so it had to be explained away... until a technique was developed to acquire observational proof that validated the implications of the original theory!

Einstein'sfield equations predicted a cosmology of an expanding universe! But, there was no real evidence that the universe was expanding when Einstein was working on his equations in the early 1910s. There was also no evidence the universe was contracting, which would happen due to gravity unless one inserted a constant to counteract (cosmological constant) into his field equations in developing the static universe model.

While Einstein was doing that, Friedman solved Einstein's field equations with the implication of the expanding universe.

We know the universe is expanding because of measurements of distance galaxies. But, at that time (early 1920s) there was merely suspicion and no substantial evidence for galaxies outside the Milky Way. The ones we could see were mostly assumed to be nebulae in our own galaxy. That was until Edwin Hubble (*that* Hubble) used Cephid variable stars as a tool to measure the distance to these mysterious nebulae and prove their extreme distance as being galaxies outside our own galaxy in the mid 1920s.

It was a few years after that until Lemaitre and Hubble correlated increasing distance with increasing redshift thus providing observational evidence for the expanding universe. Einstein adopted this explanation based on evidence.

[grskier]

I had to address this. So here was a case where the original theoretical physics (maths) predicted something that hadn't been observed, so it had to be explained away... until a technique was developed to acquire observational proof that validated the implications of the original theory!

Einstein'sfield equations predicted a cosmology of an expanding universe! But, there was no real evidence that the universe was expanding when Einstein was working on his equations in the early 1910s. There was also no evidence the universe was contracting, which would happen due to gravity unless one inserted a constant to counteract (cosmological constant) into his field equations in developing the static universe model.

While Einstein was doing that, Friedman solved Einstein's field equations with the implication of the expanding universe.

We know the universe is expanding because of measurements of distance galaxies. But, at that time (early 1920s) there was merely suspicion and no substantial evidence for galaxies outside the Milky Way. The ones we could see were mostly assumed to be nebulae in our own galaxy. That was until Edwin Hubble (*that* Hubble) used Cephid variable stars as a tool to measure the distance to these mysterious nebulae and prove their extreme distance as being galaxies outside our own galaxy in the mid 1920s.

It was a few years after that until Lemaitre and Hubble correlated increasing distance with increasing redshift thus providing observational evidence for the expanding universe. Einstein adopted this explanation based on evidence.

Nicely written..

[MontuckyFried]

I had to address this. So here was a case where the original theoretical physics (maths) predicted something that hadn't been observed, so it had to be explained away... until a technique was developed to acquire observational proof that validated the implications of the original theory!

Einstein'sfield equations predicted a cosmology of an expanding universe! But, there was no real evidence that the universe was expanding when Einstein was working on his equations in the early 1910s. There was also no evidence the universe was contracting, which would happen due to gravity unless one inserted a constant to counteract (cosmological constant) into his field equations in developing the static universe model.

While Einstein was doing that, Friedman solved Einstein's field equations with the implication of the expanding universe.

We know the universe is expanding because of measurements of distance galaxies. But, at that time (early 1920s) there was merely suspicion and no substantial evidence for galaxies outside the Milky Way. The ones we could see were mostly assumed to be nebulae in our own galaxy. That was until Edwin Hubble (*that* Hubble) used Cephid variable stars as a tool to measure the distance to these mysterious nebulae and prove their extreme distance as being galaxies outside our own galaxy in the mid 1920s.

It was a few years after that until Lemaitre and Hubble correlated increasing distance with increasing redshift thus providing observational evidence for the expanding universe. Einstein adopted this explanation based on evidence.

Nicely written..

Indeed. Excellent post. Really is an amazing field.

[Viva]

Nicely written..

Summit's one of the very few folks here who know the correct plural of "nebula".



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[GeezerSteve]

Very interesting indeed, as my experience is the opposite. The people of faith I've come across, outside of a few ultra conservative or holier than thou assholes, are generally "good people".

Where did I suggest that religious people are necessarily not "good people." WTF?

[Timberridge]

Summit's one of the very few folks here who know the correct plural of "nebula".



Sent from my XT1650 using TGR Forums mobile app

Nebula XT1650, not to be confused with Galaxy S8.

Where did I suggest that religious people are necessarily not "good people." WTF?

It's implied. Religious people tend to be cat people. Cats kill songbirds.

[Dantheman]

I had to address this. So here was a case where the original theoretical physics (maths) predicted something that hadn't been observed, so it had to be explained away... until a technique was developed to acquire observational proof that validated the implications of the original theory!

Einstein'sfield equations predicted a cosmology of an expanding universe! But, there was no real evidence that the universe was expanding when Einstein was working on his equations in the early 1910s. There was also no evidence the universe was contracting, which would happen due to gravity unless one inserted a constant to counteract (cosmological constant) into his field equations in developing the static universe model.

While Einstein was doing that, Friedman solved Einstein's field equations with the implication of the expanding universe.

We know the universe is expanding because of measurements of distance galaxies. But, at that time (early 1920s) there was merely suspicion and no substantial evidence for galaxies outside the Milky Way. The ones we could see were mostly assumed to be nebulae in our own galaxy. That was until Edwin Hubble (*that* Hubble) used Cephid variable stars as a tool to measure the distance to these mysterious nebulae and prove their extreme distance as being galaxies outside our own galaxy in the mid 1920s.

It was a few years after that until Lemaitre and Hubble correlated increasing distance with increasing redshift thus providing observational evidence for the expanding universe. Einstein adopted this explanation based on evidence.

Thanks for that. I was ruminating on something similar but this nails it. Measuring the expansion of the universe almost seems quaint now compared to the technical challenges associated with confirming the predictions of the bleeding edge of theoretical physics. I posted this in the Cool Science thread yesterday:

Hawking's final paper suggests a method to experimentally prove the existence of the multiverse
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/...al-multiverse/

Technical version. I'm pretty sure it's in english, but I have doubts.
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2018/0...ce-in-cmb.html

Imagine how much more of the Standard Model we have have proved/disproved by now if we had built the goddamn Superconducting Supercollider!

[Viva]

For want of a quasar, the supernovae were lost.

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[SumJongGuy]

I saw a show about how astronomers were chasing solar eclipses to attempt to capture good enough photographs to document expansion. Maybe it was the reboot of Cosmos with Tyson? Anyway, ya that was pretty cool how they pretty much proved that behavior/theory. Or, at least added some good solid evidence supporting it..

[PNWbrit]

Where did I suggest that religious people are necessarily not "good people." WTF?

It's not much of an indicator of them being.

[hatchgreenchile]

Where did I suggest that religious people are necessarily not "good people." WTF?

Your words were most religious people I know manifest certitude and self-righteousness..
Sounds like a bunch of intolerant and pretentious types. Good people usually don't have those qualities.

[PNWbrit]

Your words were most religious people I know manifest certitude and self-righteousness..
Sounds like a bunch of intolerant and pretentious types. Good people usually don't have those qualities.

If you're not certain you're right in your choice of religion are you really that religious?

[billyk]

Don’t know if this has already been mentioned, but I just heard on the radio that Hawking’s ashes are going to be enshrined at Westminster Abbey. A little ironic?

[PNWbrit]

Don’t know if this has already been mentioned, but I just heard on the radio that Hawking’s ashes are going to be enshrined at Westminster Abbey. A little ironic?

Appalling...

[garyfromterrace]

Hope your enjoying those upslopes G. Not great over here atm. They put snow in the forecast then it’s gone, sometimes only a couple hrs before it’s supposed to start. I hear k country got 35cm

Yeah, it's been great lately. Even the ugly sister Nakiska skied well Sat. Heading to Euroville tomorrow for 2 1/2 weeks - pretty stoked, conditions look superb where I'm headed. Have a good spring season man!

[SumJongGuy]

If you're not certain you're right in your choice of religion are you really that religious?

What about being solid that your faith and beliefs are spot on for you personally but have ZERO belief that yours is best for any other person?? It's the "I'm right and you're going to hell for disagreeing with me" attitude that wrecks society... especially when that attitude enables large groups to pass laws which discriminate against and/or harm others who disagree.