I’ve got a blog review of Alex’s book in the works.

A much simpler explanation for the arrow of time is a simple evolutionary universe. I’m not talking about a “family tree”, like Lee Smolin has proposed, I mean a truly evolutionary cosmological model, where our universe is nearly flat because leaps to configurations of greater entropic efficiency are the direction of evolution, as proven by our leap from apes to harness fire, and beyond…

That defines a true anthropic connection between humans and the forces, where the human evolutionary process carries a reciprocal connection to the forces.

This stuff falls from self-evident theory and observation as naturally as Darwin’s theory did.

Why this so hard for people to fathom, I’ll never know, given the comparitively EXTREME forms of speculation that are given more credence, but with less direct evidence.

In case nobody noticed, the high-energy photons that get released as the expanding universe “comes apart”, are critical to the creation of real massive particles from less-dense negative pressure energy… and this affects the gravity and entropy of the universe via an asymmetrical application of the second law of thermodynamics.

Hi Sean,
thanks for the weak lensing pic and darkmatter@flickr link.
Some Magic optics and freeze framed photons!
=

dark energy — energy that is inherent in the fabric of space itself

For clarification, not antagonism, I must ask, how does this differ from the Alchemical AEther?

CR, that is a frequently asked question:

http://preposterousuniverse.com/writings/cosmologyprimer/faq.html#ether

The dark energy doesn’t define a rest frame, it’s not a medium, and there is strong experimental evidence in favor of it.

interesting read in the seed magazine. i like the use of billiards in defining entropy, i am a fan of billiards myself.

perhaps we are too stringent on our boundaries of conception for what the universe looked like in the beginning?

i would suggest this idea for modeling the universe.

discus shaped but with a mirror cone shaped center mass. all rotating, (i wish i had an image, trying to describe a picture with words here) but the centroid mass not being perfectly centered. all points rotating the same speed you would have a “wobbling” effect so that on one side of the disk you have an expansion and on the other side you would have collapse. the expanding side would not be able to percieve the contracting mass due to the shear mass at the center. each side would abserve itself seperately… (am i making sense?)

then you would still be able to have low-high-low entropy cycles, the appearance of a “big bang/ big crunch” the energy of one side collapsing would fuel the other to expand, and it would explain why we can only account for a very small amount of the universe’s energy/mass…
just my thoughts… feel free to tear it apart, thats the only way to make it better!
Aaron

Alex Vilenkin has a book out on eternal inflation? Cool!

pretty soon they’ll be replacing equations with hugs and instead of performing experiments we’ll just talk about our feelings or some such thing. That can’t be right.

Is this a joke? If it is, it’s not funny, if not, it’s sexist. Either way it reflects poorly on the author.

pretty soon they’ll be replacing equations with hugs and instead of performing experiments we’ll just talk about our feelings or some such thing. That can’t be right.

Is this a joke? If it is, it’s not funny.

Now that’s funny!

On the other hand, with all these men as scientists, it’s all beer bellies and farting and sitting around watching football, so….

Sadly, this isn’t as far wrong as you’d like: I’ve had waaay too many conversations about “March Madness” and basketball than I ever imagined as a physics undergrad. Who knew that the ability to sit through beer-enhanced conversations about tall men who probably couldn’t pass freshman physics was a valuable skill for career advancement.

Sean, I find your proposal for the arrow of time problem very interesting, but I am not sure how it can avoid the “Boltzmann’s Brain” objection you described yourself in a recent post. You postulate an infinite de Sitter space in which a small patch starts inflating by a fluctuation, and this inflation evolves afterwards into our present universe. But ever from the moment of the fluctuation, all during the inflation and the post-inflation period, entropy in the patch is increasing -which means that the original fluctuation had to be more “unlikely” that the present state of the univere. Then isn’t it more likely to conclude that the present universe just fluctuated into existing as it is now instead of having evolved from the past? I don’t think any proposal to account for the arrow of time starting with a fluctuation in a time-symmetric background can escape this unacceptable “last-thurday-ist” conclusion.

In other words, my question is, how does having the inflationary phase in your model help to elude the old Boltzmann’s Brain problem?

How can people not get that Sean was just parodying the stereotypes of sexists? Sarcasm must be really dead.

(Unless the expressions of outrage were really continuing the joke by squaring it, in which case I better shut up.)

Perhaps what we need is a sarcasm smiley…. or maybe sarcasm html tags ( I was going to write them in, but apparently, they get interpreted somehow). Of course, I would expect that any familiarity at all with Sean’s previous posts would obviate the need for this.

Sean, in regards to your comment on girls becoming scientists; I saw that episode of The Simpsons too.

Sarcastic or not, Sean is dead on. Emotions and hugs are far more intricate to be tackled by a set of equations. Hence the ineptitude and fear among male scientists to emerge on the subject. Hence the boredom one might experience in a physics department. Hence the plethora of beer bellies and farting. Indeed, I too would rather be watcing a tall blond stroll down the hallway in her 4-in heels but males scientists are not mature enough to handle that. Hence their state of despair and lock-out.
Plus, it is better for a woman’s intellect and natural beauty to shine elsewhere…There are bright enough objects in the skies for the male scientists to stare at, not realizing what on the world they are missing….I would never encourage a woman to kamikatse herself unless she really really wants just that…

Fly-By Brains

sexist joke/comments

Gosh! And I thought that most people on this blog were much smarter than me. If your brain and eyes work pretty close to normal, then you’ll see the following blog contributors:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/risa/
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/joanne/

In my world both name and picture indicates gender female. Plain English tells you that they are professors etc; doing research on theoretical cosmology and astrophysics and theoretical particle physics, including the phenomenology of electroweak interactions within and beyond the Standard Model.

(WARNING: Sarcasm on the move!)

My highly speculative guess is that hugging and kissing their two beer-drinking and farting blog-colleagues is NOT the primary science activity for JoAnne and Risa.

(But, everything is relative and I might be terribly wrong – if so I do apologize to everyone offended!)

Time to reboot upper storey…

I thought the same, Rob.

I think the deal isn’t changing the presentation of the Physics, per se, but all of the other associated folderol that isn’t essential to the Physics, even if we sometimes act as if it were.

Somewhere around 6th or 7th grade kids get the message that “Math is Hard” and “Math is Not Fun.” There is a societal message that it’s OK to be really bad at math. What’s more, there are societal messages that start (probably) around that age that tell girls that they’re supposed to be worse at math and science, and that it’s not right for them to like it.

I know just from looking at freshman physics majors’ classes at Vandy that much of the damage is already done. Those classes tend to be overwhelmingly male; there are few women left to drive out at that point. (And, sadly, some do still get driven out. And, of course, some leave for good reasons, just as some men leave for good reasons.)

I suspect that Physics as Physics will be very appealing to girls and boys alike– because Physics is just so cool. I think that the real question is how to avoid putting people off of it who otherwise might have done very well at it. Many people who are driven away from Physics are driven away not by the Physics, but by the culture of how science is done.

-Rob

Chinmaya Sheth – you can’t change the presentation (and thus the methodology of) physics just because it doesn’t appeal to someone.

Who knows, I watched a program about a genius (more or less savant) who could do extremely advanced calculations in his head, and even ‘feel’ if a number was prime or not. How did he do that? Well, every number (in his head) has a different 3-dimensional shape, size and color. When you for example want to add two numbers you put them together, and the shape between represent the new number, which is the correct sum! Smart and weird…

My point is can we be sure that the ‘male’ representation of equations, math and physics is the only one…? Is it maybe not even the best one? For sure – math is a fundamental part of nature, or vice versa, but is the strange and ‘mysterious doodles’ really the ultimate tools for understanding?

I have a slight feeling that (some) people who understand complex mathematics ‘protect’ the complexity from the ‘ordinary mob’.

Let me give you an example: Sean currently wrote the article Dark Matter Exists in this blog (as you all probably know), and in a brilliant way explained how the scientists came to the conclusion. And what’s the reaction from an ‘insider’:

“I was disappointed to find this article much more personal and informal than I am used to. It read more like a teenager’s diary than a scientific examination. Unfortunately in cosmology, pictures arent enough no matter how much they’ve been photoshopped.”

I do put my hope to smart women and smart computer programming (it’s only C and Perl who allow doodling around ) to break the wall of advanced math and physics. Let’s face it – soon or later as the human knowledge grows there must be a limit for what one human brain can hold in form of data and knowledge. One solution is to have narrow specialist working in teams, but there must be a limit even for a narrow specialist when she/he go completely bananas. (maybe that’s the case today? )

I think computers are the solution – let them do much much more of the dull work – so humans can spend all time on true creativity, which should appeal to both girls and boys. And I really hope it’s not necessary to become a ‘Cyborg’ to make this work.

Dark Vader, I don’t think there is such a thing as a “‘male’ representation of equations”. I was trying to address the question of series of books that would give good understanding and keep interest alive and I think the answer is for them to be written by a collaboration between an active theorist (like Das) and an active experimentalist (like Melissinos) in their field of expertise. It would be interesting if a publisher does this, though they’ve probably thought of that…

The lives of the intellectual elite are insecure, and those in charge are TERRIFIED that a young woman will appear who accomplishes more than they have. Let us stamp out sexism, starting by deleting sexist comments on blogger!

Alex,
so what are you saying? So as long as you have declared a position on women in science before, you can either get away with a sexist comment or expect people to understand you’re making an unfunny sexist joke?

Even feminists (male and female) who spend their lives dedicated to stamping out sexism have to be called out on their sexist behaviors and are expected to correct themsleves. I’m with the original comment that if it’s a joke, it’s not funny.

But it’s okay, I’m prepared to not laugh and move on.

Since this is a blog about science, let’s get methodical and penetrate the sexist comment/joke incident.

Sean earlier this summer wrote on the subject What I Would Do If I Could: “If I could propose one thing, it would be to do everything in our power to encourage young girls to get excited about science, math, and technology.”

Suddenly this week Sean has become a rude sexist, according to some alert observers. Spending time and energy to humiliate girls with a sexist comment, alternative bad sexist joke: “…seems to me, if we start encouraging girls to become scientists, pretty soon they’ll be replacing equations with hugs and instead of performing experiments we’ll just talk about our feelings or some such thing. That can’t be right.”

The explanation for this perplexity could be:

1) Sean has unexpectedly been stricken by mental illness and his personality has split in two.

2) Sean is living a double life. Most of the time he is pro women/girls, and then for a minute or two his real nature pop up in a sexist comment/joke.

3) Cosmic Variance has been attacked by a computer virus that alters the original text.

4) Stephen Hawking is right after all – information can be destroyed and lost forever. What happened yesterday has nothing to do with what we see today. The world has gone screwy.

5) The observers have misinterpreted the information, and they did not contact the source to get more data.

I’m not the man too propose the right answer at this moment. Maybe it could be smart to see what the accused has to say, and how he feels etc.

With fame I become more and more stupid, which of course is a very common phenomenon. — Albert Einstein

It’s obvious that some are sensitive indeed. But it’s also obvious that some are missing on the sensitivity bit.

I thought the sarcasm was obvious but in bad taste.

My first time commenting. Really great blog. Thanks to bloggers and responders.

On Sean and girls in science. I attended an OECD conference in Amsterdam last fall on “Declining Youth Interest in Science Studies”. It reported on a study in which 22 countries looked at enrolment and graduation rates in science discplines. Physics, chemistry and math are in trouble – OECD-wide. In particular, girls shun these subjects increasingly. (Female participation in higher education is increasing faster than that of males, but in the science subjects, the rate of increase is slower. In physics, there’s a decline in many countries).

Another part of the study looked at ways in which different countries are tackling the problem. Many of the techniques involve working with younger girls in grade school to encourage them. At these age-levels, girls love science as much as boys, though often in different ways and for different reasons (vive la difference!). The drop-off starts to occur in junior high school. For boys and girls, partly to keep grade point averages up (i.e. science is hard). For girls, partly because of what some of the responders to this blog allude to – the way in which science is presented in school and in texts. One woman at the conference responded to a discussion of some very innovative promotional activities targeted to young females to encourage them to pursue science at university. She said: “You can do all the promotion you want and you’ll probably succeed in getting more girls to enrol in university science. But if the universities keep teaching science the way they do now, the girls will drop out!” We have to face facts, folks. We have a real problem – and its a cultural one.

If you’re interested I’ll tell you about a Dutch university that solved the problem… (I’m a Canadian so there’s no nationalistic promotion here.)

The Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen was suffering declining enrolments in S&T disciplines, especially physics, chemistry, math. About eight years ago a new Dean of Science came onboard. He commissioned a survey of local high school students to find out their perceptions of his faculty and its teaching. The survey indicated words like “boring” “too hard”, etc. All the typical things. The Dean launched a two-part campaign to change things around. Part One was a promotional campaign targeted to youth via websites, etc. Part Two was a major curriculum and teaching reform. At the undergrad level, they created multidisciplinary programs to attract students with broader scientific interests (natural science, molecular life science, information science, environmental science.) They also created new masters level courses.

But here’s the innovation I found most interesting: For physics, the Dean instituted a tutor system designed to help students with difficult course content. He recruited high school physics teachers to advise on the introductory course content to ensure a good transition from high school. These teachers were available to tutor students if needed. They also provided feedback to professors on their teaching methods. They attended lectures, evaluated the teaching, and gave profs feedback on how to improve! You can imagine how the profs liked that! The Dean got a great deal of push back from the profs. They recruit new profs based on research excellence, not teaching excellence. They warned him that the university would gain a mickey mouse reputation and lose lots of its research funding. End of story: the Dean persisted, the profs came around (albeit grudgingly), research funding went up, enrolments went up, drop out rates declined.

If you’re interested in the OECD conference and studies, see their final report at http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/16/30/36645825.pdf

Thanks, Jeffsan!