Stephen Hawking
Understanding the Universe: On Stephen Hawking's Physics
Pictures & Quotes 'A Brief History of Time', Biography
My goal is simple. It is complete understanding of the universe, why it is as it is and why it exists at all. (Stephen Hawking)
But maybe that is our mistake: maybe there are no particle positions and velocities, but only waves. It is just that we try to fit the waves to our preconceived ideas of positions and velocities.The resulting mismatch is the cause of the apparent unpredictability.
(Stephen Hawking, "A Brief History in Time" 1988)
Introduction - Metaphysics & Philosophy of Stephen Hawking's 'A Brief History of Time'.
Hello. Below you will find a collection of quotes from Stephen Hawking's (sp. Steven) 'A Brief History of Time' explained by the Metaphysics of Space and Motion and the Wave Structure of Matter. The purpose is to explain how his ideas (and some of the resultant problems) can now be simply and sensibly solved. To do this we must change our perspective for describing reality from matter, to the Space in which all matter exists.
Please see links on the side of this page for the main articles which explain and solve many of the problems of postmodern Metaphysics, Physics and Philosophy from the new foundation of the Metaphysics of Space and Motion and the Wave Structure of Matter (WSM).
Stephen Hawking and the Big Bang Theory
In 1929, Edwin Hubble made the landmark observation that wherever you look, distant galaxies are moving rapidly away from us. In other words, the universe is expanding. This means at earlier times objects would have been closer together.
Hubble's observations suggested that there was a time, called the big bang, when the universe was infinitesimally small and infinitely dense.
In the years following his proof of the existence of other galaxies, Hubble spent his time cataloguing their distances and observing their spectra. At that time most people expected the galaxies to be moving around quite randomly, and so expected to find as many blue-shifted spectra as red-shifted ones. It was quite a surprise, therefore, to find that most galaxies appeared red-shifted: nearly all were moving away from us! More surprisingly still was the finding that Hubble published in 1929: even the size of a galaxy's red shift is not random, but is directly proportional to the galaxy's distance from us. Or, in other words, the farther a galaxy is, the faster it is moving away! And that meant that the universe could not be static, as everyone previously thought, but is in fact expanding; the distance between the different galaxies is growing all the time. (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History in Time)
The obvious error here is the hidden assumption that the redshift with distance (which is an empirical fact) is caused by a Doppler shift (an assumption) and thus the Universe is expanding from a 'Big Bang'. This shows the error of moving from empirical truths (redshift with distance) to theoretical interpretations (redshift caused by receding motion, thus universe is expanding). To write that we observe galaxies moving apart is not science, and it is hard to believe that a famous scientist could write this, yet it occurs frequently and causes science many problems (Similar to the error of saying that the velocity of light is observed to be constant - it is not, it is observed to be the same, that it is constant is a further theoretical interpretation - which is also incorrect).
The Wave Structure of Matter deduces the redshift with distance as being due to decreasing wave contributions from matter with distance. See;
https://www.spaceandmotion.com/Cosmology - A complete explanation of how our finite spherical universe exists within an infinite Space.
https://www.spaceandmotion.com/Cosmology-Big-Bang-Theory - Three leading dissident scientists, Halton Arp, Eric Lerner and Bill Mitchell explain many of the problems with the Big Bang theory of the Cosmos.
Discussion of Quotations from Stephen Hawking's 'A Brief History of Time'
If everything in the universe depends upon everything else in a fundamental way, it might be impossible to get close to a full solution by investigating parts of the problem in isolation. (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History in Time, p12)
Yes. The Wave Structure of Matter explains how everything is interconnected, and thus why we can learn about the structure of the universe as a whole (which also contradicts big bang).
Yet if there really is a complete unified theory, it would also presumably determine our actions. And so the theory itself would determine the outcome of our search for it! (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History in Time, p13)
No. There can be no pre-determination of future events in an infinite system / space, of which our finite spherical universe is a part.
The special theory of relativity was very successful in explaining that the speed of light appears the same to all observers and in describing what happens when things move at speeds close to the speed of light. However, it was inconsistent with the Newtonian theory of gravity, which said that objects attracted each other with a force that depended on the distance between them. This meant that if one moved one of the objects, the force on the other one would change instantaneously. Or in other words, gravitational effects should travel with infinite velocity, instead of at or below the speed of light, as the special theory of relativity required. (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History in Time, p31)
No. All matter interactions are limited by the velocity of waves in space. It is true that if you move an object, over time, as the spherical out-waves flow out, these changes in location will slightly affect all other matter in the universe, which in turn will affect their out waves coming back in (i.e. karma, our past affects ).
Newton's law of motion put an end to the idea of absolute position in space. The theory of relativity gets rid of absolute time. (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History in Time, p35)
This is where Einstein confused things. He is correct that space, time and matter are all interconnected, that matter is not discrete particles. His error, to try and unite them by representing matter as continuous spherical force fields in space-time, rather than spherical waves in space. The Wave Structure of Matter (WSM) removes the need for time as a metaphysical 'substance' (how is it connected to space and matter) and explains time as the human construction / perception that matter moves in space (thus connecting matter and time back to space, as wave motions of space). There is no reason why we cannot use the idea of absolute time as a common reference to determine the absolute velocity of waves in space. But it is an absolute time in a slightly different sense than used by Newton and Kant. See;
Physics: Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity
We can never be quite sure that we had indeed found the correct theory, since theories can't be proven. But if the theory was mathematically consistent and always gave predictions that agreed with observations, we could be reasonably confident it was the right one. It would bring to an end a long and glorious chapter in the history of humanity's intellectual struggle to understand the universe. But it would also revolutionise the ordinary person's understanding of the universe. (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History in Time, p178)
This is the goal for mathematical physicists. To develop a better mathematical physics founded on the WSM. Milo Wolff has done the most in this area. I also believe that we can use metaphysics to deduce the most simple logical (scientific) description of reality. The most simple theory must be founded on One thing, which is necessary to connect the many things (such that there can be logic and mathematical physics). See;
Metaphysics: Scientific Language for Describing Reality
But maybe that is our mistake: maybe there are no particle positions and velocities, but only waves. It is just that we try to fit the waves to our preconceived ideas of positions and velocities. The resulting mismatch is the cause of the apparent unpredictability. (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History in Time)
The most important quote in the book.
However, in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, science became too technical and mathematical for the philosophers or anyone else except for a few specialists. Philosophers reduced the scope of their inquiries so much that Wittgenstein the most famous philosopher this century, said "The sole remaining task for philosophy is the analysis of language." What a comedown from the great tradition of philosophy from Aristotle to Kant! (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History in Time)
They were both wrong. A careful study of philosophy physics and metaphysics shows this. Yes, use of language is critical, defining meaning of words and their necessary connections is critical (i.e. principles), and if we are to describe reality, these words / principles must connect back to the one thing that exists. As I see it, absolute truth and meaning of words comes from absolute space and its properties.
Aristotle was pretty spot on with many things, very close to the truth. Kant pointed out our errors, that particles, space and time cannot exist as separate 'substances' and must merely be ideas, human constructions. See;
Kant, Immanuel - Space and Motion (not Time) as Synthetic a priori Foundations for Human Knowledge and Reason. From Kantian Idealism to Realism.
As we shall see, the concept of time has no meaning before the beginning of the universe. This was first pointed out by St. Augustine. When asked: What did God do before he created the universe? Augustine didn't reply: He was preparing Hell for people who asked such questions. Instead, he said that time was a property of the universe that God created, and that time did not exist before the beginning of the universe. (Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time)
I think this is simply nonsense caused by the error of assuming a big bang and thus a beginning to time. I quote two famous philosophers in reply;
(Cicero) I ask you both, why did these creators of the world suddenly wake up, after apparently having been asleep from time immemorial? Even if there was then no world, time must still have been passing. Time, I say, and not those periods of time which are measured by the number of nights and days in the course of a year. I admit that these depend upon the circular movement of the world. But from all eternity there has been an infinite time, unmeasurable by any periodical divisions. This we can understand from the analogy of space. But we cannot even conceive that once upon a time there was no time at all.
(Aristotle, Metaphysics) Motion must always have been in existence, and the same can be said for time itself, since it is not even possible for there to be an earlier and a later if time does not exist. Movement, then, is also continuous in the way in which time is - indeed time is either identical to movement or is some affection of it. ... The entire preoccupation of the physicist is with things that contain within themselves a principle of movement and rest. ... It need hardly be pointed out that with things that do not change there is no illusion with respect to time, given the assumption of their unchangeability. ... about its coming into being and its doings and about all its alterations we think that we have knowledge when we know the source of its movement. ... that among entities there must be some cause which moves and combines things. And to seek for this is to seek for the second kind of principle, as we would say, that from which comes the beginning of the change. ... Unless the further factor is active, there will still be no movement. There must then be a principle of such a kind that its substance is activity .
This is the end of my (abrupt!) discussion. Below are some further interesting quotes from Stephen Hawking.
Hubble's observations suggested that there was a time, called the big bang, when the universe was infinitesimally small and infinitely dense. Under such conditions all the laws of science, and therefore all ability to predict the future, would break down. If there were events earlier than this time, then they could not affect what happens at the present time. Their existence can be ignored because it would have no observational consequences. One may say that time had a beginning at the big bang, in the sense that earlier times simply would not be defined. It should be emphasized that this beginning in time is very different from those that had been considered previously. In an unchanging universe a beginning in time is something that has to be imposed by some being outside the universe; there is no physical necessity for a beginning. One can imagine that God created the universe at literally any time in the past. On the other hand, if the universe is expanding, there may be physical reasons why there had to be a beginning. One could imagine that God created the universe at the instant of the big bang, or even afterwards in just such a way as to make it look as though there had been a big bang, but it would be meaningless to suppose that it was created before the big bang. An expanding universe does not preclude a creator, but it does place limits on when he might have carried out his job! [Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time 1988, pp. 8-9.]
Throughout the 1970s I had been mainly studying black holes, but in 1981 my interest in questions about the origin and fate of the universe was reawakened when I attended a conference on cosmology organized by the Jesuits in the Vatican. The Catholic Church had made a bad mistake with Galileo when it tried to lay down the law on a question of science, declaring that the sun went round the earth. Now, centuries later, it had decided to invite a number of experts to advise it on cosmology. At the end of the conference the participants were granted an audience with the pope. He told us that it was all right to study the evolution of the universe after the big bang, but we should not inquire into the big bang itself because that was the moment of Creation and therefore the work of God. I was glad then that he did know the subject of the talk I had just given at the conference -- the possibility that space- time was finite but had no boundary, which means that it had no beginning, no moment of Creation. I had no desire to share the fate of Galileo, with whom I feel a strong sense of identity, partly because of the coincidence of having been born exactly 300 years after his death! [Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time (New York: Bantam, 1988), pp. 115-16.]
The intelligent beings in these regions should therefore not be surprised if they observe that their locality in the universe satisfies the conditions that are necessary for their existence. It is a bit like a rich person living in a wealthy neighborhood not seeing any poverty. [Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time p. 124.]
The quantum theory of gravity has opened up a new possibility, in which there would be no boundary to space-time and so there would be no need to specify the behavior at the boundary. There would be no singularities at which the laws of science broke down and no edge of space-time at which one would have to appeal to God or some new law to set the boundary conditions for space-time. One could say: 'The boundary condition of the universe is that it has no boundary.' The universe would be completely self-contained and not affected by anything outside itself. It would neither be created nor destroyed. It would just BE. [Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time, p. 136.]
The idea that space and time may form a closed surface without boundary also has profound implications for the role of God in the affairs of the universe. With the success of scientific theories in describing events, most people have come to believe that God allows the universe to evolve according to a set of laws and does not intervene in the universe to break these laws. However, the laws do not tell us what the universe should have looked like when it started -- it would still be up to God to wind up the clockwork and choose how to start it off. So long as the universe had a beginning, we could suppose it had a creator. But if the universe is really completely self-contained, having no boundary or edge, it would have neither beginning nor end: it would simply be. What place, then, for a creator? [Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time, p. 140-41.]
God not only plays dice. He sometimes throws the dice where they cannot be seen.
What I have done is to show that it is possible for the way the universe began to be determined by the laws of science. In that case, it would not be necessary to appeal to God to decide how the universe began. This doesn't prove that there is no God, only that God is not necessary. [Stephen W. Hawking, Der Spiegel, 1989]
The intelligent beings in these regions should therefore not be surprised if they observe that their locality in the universe satisfies the conditions that are necessary for their existence. It is a bit like a rich person living in a wealthy neighborhood not seeing any poverty.
One does not have to appeal to God to set the initial conditions for the creation of the universe, but if one does He would have to act through the laws of physics. [Stephen Hawking, Black Holes & Baby Universes]
https://atheism.about.com/library/quotes/bl_q_SHawking.htm
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"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."
(Mohandas Gandhi)
"When forced to summarize the general theory of relativity in one sentence:
Time and space and gravitation have no separate existence from matter. ... Physical objects are not in space, but these objects are spatially extended. In this way the concept 'empty space' loses its meaning. ... The particle can only appear as a limited region in space in which
the field strength or the energy density are particularly high. ...
The free, unhampered exchange of ideas and scientific conclusions is necessary for the sound development of science, as it is in all spheres
of cultural life. ... We must not conceal from ourselves that no improvement in the present depressing situation is possible without
a severe struggle; for the handful of those who are really determined to do something is minute in comparison with the mass of the lukewarm
and the misguided. ...
Humanity is going to need a substantially new way of thinking if it is to survive!" (Albert Einstein)
Our world is in great trouble due to human behaviour founded on myths and customs that are causing the destruction of Nature and climate change. We can now deduce the most simple science theory of reality - the wave structure of matter in space. By understanding how we and everything around us are interconnected
in Space we can then deduce solutions to the fundamental problems of human knowledge in physics, philosophy, metaphysics, theology, education, health, evolution and ecology, politics and society.
This is the profound new way of thinking that Einstein
realised, that we exist as spatially extended structures of the universe - the discrete and separate body an illusion. This simply confirms the
intuitions of the ancient philosophers and mystics.
Given the current censorship in physics / philosophy of science journals (based on the standard model of particle physics / big bang cosmology) the internet is the best hope for getting new knowledge
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