The Physics of God and the Quantum Gravity Theory of Everything∗
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Anthropic Measure of Hominid (And Other) Terrestrials. Brandon Carter Luth, Observatoire De Paris-Meudon
Anthropic measure of hominid (and other) terrestrials. Brandon Carter LuTh, Observatoire de Paris-Meudon. Provisional draft, April 2011. Abstract. According to the (weak) anthropic principle, the a priori proba- bility per unit time of finding oneself to be a member of a particular popu- lation is proportional to the number of individuals in that population, mul- tiplied by an anthropic quotient that is normalised to unity in the ordinary (average adult) human case. This quotient might exceed unity for conceiv- able superhuman extraterrestrials, but it should presumably be smaller for our terrestrial anthropoid relations, such as chimpanzees now and our pre- Neanderthal ancestors in the past. The (ethically relevant) question of how much smaller can be addressed by invoking the anthropic finitude argument, using Bayesian reasonning, whereby it is implausible a posteriori that the total anthropic measure should greatly exceed the measure of the privileged subset to which we happen to belong, as members of a global civilisation that has (recently) entered a climactic phase with a timescale of demographic expansion and technical development short compared with a breeding gen- eration. As well as “economist’s dream” scenarios with continual growth, this finitude argument also excludes “ecologist’s dream” scenarios with long term stabilisation at some permanently sustainable level, but it it does not imply the inevitability of a sudden “doomsday” cut-off. A less catastrophic likelihood is for the population to decline gradually, after passing smoothly through a peak value that is accounted for here as roughly the information content ≈ 1010 of our genome. The finitude requirement limits not just the future but also the past, of which the most recent phase – characterised by memetic rather than genetic evolution – obeyed the Foerster law of hyperbolic population growth. -
The Pursuit of Quantum Gravity
The Pursuit of Quantum Gravity Cécile DeWitt-Morette The Pursuit of Quantum Gravity Memoirs of Bryce DeWitt from 1946 to 2004 123 Cécile DeWitt-Morette Department of Physics Center for Relativity University of Texas at Austin Austin Texas USA [email protected] ISBN 978-3-642-14269-7 e-ISBN 978-3-642-14270-3 DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-14270-3 Springer Heidelberg Dordrecht London New York Library of Congress Control Number: 2011921724 c Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2011 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved, whether the whole or part of the material is con- cerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilm or in any other way, and storage in data banks. Duplication of this publica- tion or parts thereof is permitted only under the provisions of the German Copyright Law of September 9, 1965, in its current version, and permission for use must always be obtained from Springer. Violations are liable to prosecution under the German Copyright Law. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protec- tive laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. Cover design:WMXDesignGmbH,Heidelberg Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com) Dedicated to our daughters, Nicolette, Jan, Christiane, Abigail Preface This book is written for the curious reader. I hope it will also be a good read for the professional physicist. -
INTERPRETER§ a Journal of Mormon Scripture
INTERPRETER§ A Journal of Mormon Scripture Volume 21 • 2016 The Interpreter Foundation Orem, Utah The Interpreter Foundation Chairman and President Contributing Editors Daniel C. Peterson Robert S. Boylan John M. Butler Vice Presidents James E. Faulconer Jeffrey M. Bradshaw Kristine Wardle Frederickson Daniel Oswald Benjamin I. Huff Allen Wyatt Jennifer C. Lane David J. Larsen Executive Board Donald W. Parry Kevin Christensen Ugo A. Perego Steven T. Densley, Jr. Stephen D. Ricks Brant A. Gardner William J. Hamblin G. Bruce Schaalje Jeff Lindsay Andrew C. Smith Louis C. Midgley John A. Tvedtnes George L. Mitton Sidney B. Unrau Gregory L. Smith Stephen T. Whitlock Tanya Spackman Lynne Hilton Wilson Ted Vaggalis Mark Alan Wright Board of Editors Donor Relations Matthew L. Bowen Jann E. Campbell David M. Calabro Alison V. P. Coutts Treasurer Craig L. Foster Kent Flack Taylor Halverson Ralph C. Hancock Production Editor & Designers Cassandra S. Hedelius Kelsey Fairbanks Avery Benjamin L. McGuire Tyler R. Moulton Timothy Guymon Mike Parker Bryce M. Haymond Martin S. Tanner Bryan J. Thomas Gordon C. Thomasson A. Keith Thompson John S. Thompson Bruce F. Webster The Interpreter Foundation Editorial Consultants Media & Technology Talia A. K. Abbott Sean Canny † Linda Hunter Adams Scott Dunaway Merrie Kay Ames Richard Flygare Jill Bartholomew Brad Haymond Tyson Briggs Tyler R. Moulton Starla Butler Tom Pittman Joshua Chandler Russell D. Richins Kasen Christensen S. Hales Swift Ryan Daley Victor Worth Marcia Gibbs Jolie Griffin Laura Hales Hannah Morgan Jordan Nate Eric Naylor Don Norton Neal Rappleye Jared Riddick William Shryver Stephen Owen Smoot Kaitlin Cooper Swift Jennifer Tonks Austin Tracy Kyle Tuttle Scott Wilkins © 2016 The Interpreter Foundation. -
Inflation and the Theory of Cosmological Perturbations
Inflation and the Theory of Cosmological Perturbations A. Riotto INFN, Sezione di Padova, via Marzolo 8, I-35131, Padova, Italy. Abstract These lectures provide a pedagogical introduction to inflation and the theory of cosmological per- turbations generated during inflation which are thought to be the origin of structure in the universe. Lectures given at the: Summer School on arXiv:hep-ph/0210162v2 30 Jan 2017 Astroparticle Physics and Cosmology Trieste, 17 June - 5 July 2002 1 Notation A few words on the metric notation. We will be using the convention (−; +; +; +), even though we might switch time to time to the other option (+; −; −; −). This might happen for our convenience, but also for pedagogical reasons. Students should not be shielded too much against the phenomenon of changes of convention and notation in books and articles. Units We will adopt natural, or high energy physics, units. There is only one fundamental dimension, energy, after setting ~ = c = kb = 1, [Energy] = [Mass] = [Temperature] = [Length]−1 = [Time]−1 : The most common conversion factors and quantities we will make use of are 1 GeV−1 = 1:97 × 10−14 cm=6:59 × 10−25 sec, 1 Mpc= 3.08×1024 cm=1.56×1038 GeV−1, 19 MPl = 1:22 × 10 GeV, −1 −1 −42 H0= 100 h Km sec Mpc =2.1 h × 10 GeV, 2 −29 −3 2 4 −3 2 −47 4 ρc = 1:87h · 10 g cm = 1:05h · 10 eV cm = 8:1h × 10 GeV , −13 T0 = 2:75 K=2.3×10 GeV, 2 Teq = 5:5(Ω0h ) eV, Tls = 0:26 (T0=2:75 K) eV. -
The Impact of Lester E. Bush, Jr.•Łs Â
Utah State University DigitalCommons@USU Arrington Student Writing Award Winners Leonard J. Arrington Mormon History Lectures 12-2013 Leveraging Doubt: The Impact of Lester E. Bush, Jr.‟s “Mormonism‟s Negro Doctrine: A Historical Overview” on Mormon Thought Chad L. Nielsen Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/arrington_stwriting Recommended Citation Nielsen, Chad L., "Leveraging Doubt: The Impact of Lester E. Bush, Jr.'s "Mormonism's Negro Doctrine: A Historical Overview"" (2013). Arrington Student Writing Award Winners. This Essay is brought to you for free and open access by the Leonard J. Arrington Mormon History Lectures at DigitalCommons@USU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Arrington Student Writing Award Winners by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@USU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Leveraging Doubt Leveraging Doubt: The Impact of Lester E. Bush, Jr.‟s “Mormonism‟s Negro Doctrine: A Historical Overview” on Mormon Thought Chad L. Nielsen Utah State University 1 Leveraging Doubt The most exciting single event of the years I [Leonard J. Arrington] was church historian occurred on June 9, 1978, when the First Presidency announced a divine revelation that all worthy males might be granted the priesthood…. Just before noon my secretary, Nedra Yeates Pace, telephoned with remarkable news: Spencer W. Kimball had just announced a revelation that all worthy males, including those of African descent, might be ordained to the priesthood. Within five minutes, my son Carle Wayne telephoned from New York City to say he had heard the news. I was in the midst of sobbing with gratitude for this answer to our prayers and could hardly speak with him. -
Endorsement by Dr Robert Lawrence Kuhn, Closer to Truth
Closer To Truth Robert Lawrence Kuhn May 25, 2020 To Whom It May Concern: It is a pleasure to provide our wholehearted endorsement of the ZerOrigIndia project and to offer Closer To Truth’s public outreach and promotional resources to support the vital research and understanding of “Zero” as it will no doubt emerge from the ZerOrigIndia project. The concept of Zero is both a critical event in intellectual history and a milestone in the development of mathematics, science and technology. The exploration of zero’s origin, culturally and linguistically as well as mathematically and philosophically, could elicit novel ideas and new ways of thinking. Moreover, the broader philosophical significance of Zero reveals transcendental ideas of Nothing, Emptiness, Void, Blank as features of reality to be apprehended and appreciated and perhaps applied to entirely new categories of thought. Indeed, “Nothing” is a prime Closer To Truth theme. The outstanding group of scholars and thinkers devoted to ZerOrigIndia should encourage our support. Closer To Truth will publish and promote relevant research from the ZerOrigIndia project. As background, Closer To Truth (CTT), featuring world-renown scientists and philosophers, is the definitive PBS/public television series and web archive on Cosmos (cosmology/physics/mathematics, philosophy of science), Consciousness (brain/mind, philosophy of mind) and Meaning/God (theism/atheism/agnosticism, philosophy of religion, critical thinking). The Closer To Truth YouTube channel, offering high intellectual content, is running at >1 million views and >11 million minutes watched per month; >125,000 subscribers; >60% outside the US. You may use my endorsement to support the ZerOrigIndia project in any way deemed appropriate. -
Vulgarity in Literature and the Visual Arts of the English- Speaking World
H-Announce Vulgarity in Literature and the Visual Arts of the English- speaking World Announcement published by Marianne Hillion on Friday, March 9, 2018 Type: Call for Papers Date: March 19, 2018 Location: France Subject Fields: Art, Art History & Visual Studies, Literature, Linguistics, American History / Studies, British History / Studies CONFERENCE - Vulgarity in literature and the visual arts of the English-speaking world Paris Sorbonne University June 2, 2018 Deadline for abstract submissions: March 19, 2018. Conference organised by the doctoral student research group OVALE – part of the VALE research group, EA4085, Sorbonne University. Keynote speaker: Jonathon Green, slang lexicographer and author of Green’s Dictionary of Slang "thou claybrained guts, thou knotty-pated fool, thou whoreson, obscene, greasy tallow- catch" Shakespeare, Henri IV, I (I,4) With these colourful words, Shakespeare conjures up his most accomplished comic character. A figure of garish excess in both body and language, the larger-than-life Falstaff is a unique literary creation. In him, vulgarity is not only given prime position but posterity in the world of belles-lettres. The representation of vulgarity remains nonetheless a polemical choice. Time and again, the vulgar has been suspected of a sensationalist agenda or of compromising quality. However, for a number of thinkers and literary critics, it is a legitimate attempt to capture the vitality of life through language. This only exemplifies the notional ambivalence of the term and the tension at the heart of its definition: between inclusion and exclusion, between what is common, oral, shared by all (vulgar tongue) and what is cheap, in bad taste and unrefined. -
Events and the Nature of Time: Seth Lloyd Source URL
Events and the Nature of Time: Seth Lloyd Source URL: https://www.closertotruth.com/interviews/55447 Transcript - Long Robert Lawrence Kuhn: Seth, we're both at this – start again. Seth, we're both at this FQXi Conference in Banff, this beautiful area, um, about the physics of events, the importance of events and understanding what physics is, and one of the topics that we're looking at is the nature of time and how events can help us understand what time really is. How – how does that work? How can events help us understand what time is? Seth Lloyd: Well, now, that is something that unfolds in time, like a clock ticking or a – an electron moving from here to there, or a bit flipping in a computer. Or, you know, just our thoughts moving on and our conversation progressing. Um, now time is a mysterious thing and we don't understand it well. Heraclitus said that time is like a river, like this beautiful river here [clears throat], the water flowing and then time ever moving onward and, um – ah, but what makes us feel and perceive that time is going? Um, so, ah – the first answer is I don't know. Robert Lawrence Kuhn: Almost every question is the same. [Laughter.] Seth Lloyd: Yeah, um, but – but there are, ah, different eras of time. There's a perceptual era of time where we don't know something and then we know – know something that we didn't know. This is about getting information. Um, there's a – a conversation, talking back and forth, interacting, where – where you tell me some information, I get the information. -
Eternal Inflation and Its Implications
IOP PUBLISHING JOURNAL OF PHYSICS A: MATHEMATICAL AND THEORETICAL J. Phys. A: Math. Theor. 40 (2007) 6811–6826 doi:10.1088/1751-8113/40/25/S25 Eternal inflation and its implications Alan H Guth Center for Theoretical Physics, Laboratory for Nuclear Science, and Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA E-mail: [email protected] Received 8 February 2006 Published 6 June 2007 Online at stacks.iop.org/JPhysA/40/6811 Abstract Isummarizetheargumentsthatstronglysuggestthatouruniverseisthe product of inflation. The mechanisms that lead to eternal inflation in both new and chaotic models are described. Although the infinity of pocket universes produced by eternal inflation are unobservable, it is argued that eternal inflation has real consequences in terms of the way that predictions are extracted from theoretical models. The ambiguities in defining probabilities in eternally inflating spacetimes are reviewed, with emphasis on the youngness paradox that results from a synchronous gauge regularization technique. Although inflation is generically eternal into the future, it is not eternal into the past: it can be proven under reasonable assumptions that the inflating region must be incomplete in past directions, so some physics other than inflation is needed to describe the past boundary of the inflating region. PACS numbers: 98.80.cQ, 98.80.Bp, 98.80.Es 1. Introduction: the successes of inflation Since the proposal of the inflationary model some 25 years ago [1–4], inflation has been remarkably successful in explaining many important qualitative and quantitative properties of the universe. In this paper, I will summarize the key successes, and then discuss a number of issues associated with the eternal nature of inflation. -
Editorial Note To: Brandon Carter, Large Number Coincidences and the Anthropic Principle in Cosmology
Gen Relativ Gravit (2011) 43:3213–3223 DOI 10.1007/s10714-011-1257-8 GOLDEN OLDIE EDITORIAL Editorial note to: Brandon Carter, Large number coincidences and the anthropic principle in cosmology George F. R. Ellis Published online: 27 September 2011 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011 Keywords Cosmology · Confrontation of cosmological theories with observational data · Anthropic principle · World ensemble · Golden Oldie Editorial The anthropic principle is one of the most controversial proposals in cosmology. It relates to why the universe is of such a nature as to allow the existence of life. This inevitably engages with the foundations of cosmology, and has philosophical as well as technical aspects. The literature on the topic is vast—the Carter paper reprinted here [10] has 226 listed citations, and the Barrow and Tipler book [3] has 1,740. Obviously I can only pick up on a few of these papers in this brief review of the impact of the paper. While there were numerous previous philosophical treatises on the topic, stretching back to speculations about the origin of the universe in ancient times (see [3]fora magisterial survey), scientific studies are more recent. A well known early one was by biologist Alfred Russell Wallace, who wrote in 1904: “Such a vast and complex uni- verse as that which we know exists around us, may have been absolutely required … in order to produce a world that should be precisely adapted in every detail for the orderly development of life culminating in man” [50]. But that was before modern cosmology was established: the idea of the expanding and evolving universe was yet to come. -
Comptia® Security+ SY0-601 Cert Guide
CompTIA® Security+ SY0-601 Cert Guide Omar Santos Ron Taylor Joseph Mlodzianowski A01_Santos_Fm_pi-plii_1.indd 1 01/06/21 2:49 pm CompTIA® Security+ SY0-601 Cert Guide Editor-in-Chief Copyright © 2022 by Pearson Education, Inc. Mark Taub All rights reserved. No part of this book shall be reproduced, stored in Product Line Manager a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, Brett Bartow photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher. No patent liability is assumed with respect to the use of the Executive Editor information contained herein. Although every precaution has been taken in Nancy Davis the preparation of this book, the publisher and author assume no respon- Development Editor sibility for errors or omissions. Nor is any liability assumed for damages Christopher A. Cleveland resulting from the use of the information contained herein. ISBN-13: 978-0-13-677031-2 Managing Editor ISBN-10: 0-13-677031-2 Sandra Schroeder Library of Congress Control Number: 2021935686 Senior Project Editor ScoutAutomatedPrintCode Tonya Simpson Copy Editor Trademarks Chuck Hutchinson All terms mentioned in this book that are known to be trademarks or ser- vice marks have been appropriately capitalized. Pearson IT Certification Indexer cannot attest to the accuracy of this information. Use of a term in this book Erika Millen should not be regarded as affecting the validity of any trademark or service mark. Proofreader Abigail Manheim Warning and Disclaimer Technical Editor Every effort has been made to make this book as complete and as accurate Chris Crayton as possible, but no warranty or fitness is implied. -
CURRICULUM VITA Edward Ott Distinguished University Professor of Electrical Engineering and of Physics
CURRICULUM VITA Edward Ott Distinguished University Professor of Electrical Engineering and of Physics I. Personal Data: Date and Place of Birth: Dec. 22, 1941, New York City, NY Home Address: 12421 Borges Ave., Silver Spring, MD 20904 Work Address: Institute for Plasma Research University of Maryland College Park, MD 20472 Work Telephone: (301)405-5033 II. Education: B.S. (1963), Electrical Engineering, The Cooper Union. M.S. (1965), Electrophysics, Polytechnic University. Ph.D. (1967), Electrophysics, Polytechnic University. III. Experience: 1967-1968 NSF Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, Cambridge University, Cambridge, U.K. 1968-1979 Faculty of the Department of Electrical Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. 1976 and Plasma Physics Division, Naval Research 1971-1972 Laboratory, Washington, D.C. 1985 Institute for Theoretical Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA. 1979-Present Department of Physics and Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD. (Ott–2) IV. Professional Activities: Fellow, American Physical Society. Fellow, IEEE. Fellow, World Innovation Foundation. Listed in the Highly Cited Researchers Database of the ISI. Associate Editor, Physics of Fluids (1977–1979). Correspondent, Comments on Plasma Physics (1983–1993). Board of Editors, Physical Review A (1986–1988). Divisional Associate Editor, Physical Review Letters (1989–1993). Editor of Special Issue of Chaos on Chaotic Scattering (1993). Advisory Board, Chaos: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Nonlinear Science (1991–2000). Editorial Board, Chaos: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Nonlinear Science (2000–2003). Editorial Board, Dynamics and Stability of Systems (1995–2000). Editorial Board, Central European Journal of Physics (2002–present). Editor, Physica D: Nonlinear Phenomena (1999–2002).