What do you think?
Rate this book
Theory of Nothing
The "Theory of Nothing" explores the radical idea that the reality we see around us is but one of an infinite "library" of alternate realities, the sum of which contains no information and is in fact "Nothing". The necessity for observed reality to be consistent with the observer's existence implies a strong connection between fundamental physics and cognitive science. A revolutionary understanding of why physics has the form it does, and why our minds are the way they are is forged.
262 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 15, 2006
16 people are currently reading
341 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
April 17, 2022
Multiverse
This book is about math and physics so forget everything you saw in Spider-Man 3 or Doctor Strange. let's start shall we 😎
In Borges’s Library of Babel, Jorge imagined a library so vast it contained not only all the books ever published with fewer than 1.3 million letters, but also all possible books with fewer than 1.3 million characters typed by monkeys hitting keys on a typewriter.
while reading THE LIBRARY OF BABEL I said to myself 'Jorge Luis' you are a genius this is the the best imaginary model of the Multiverse.
Otherwise I'm a big fan of the ANTHROPIC PRINCIPLE (the improbable conjunction between a series of laws and constants of nature, and their very great precision specific to generating life.)
What I would like to know is how science explains this precision so incredible?
Well, the answer is the Multiverse.🏆
According to the multiverse theory, there is not just one universe, there are billions and billions of them, each with its own laws and constants. In our universe, the omega is point fifty-nine zeros, in another universe it will be point fifty-eight zeros, and so on. Each universe has its own laws and constants, with values varying from case to case. Considering that there are billions and billions of different universes, it is statistically inevitable that some have found the right formula for creating life. There is therefore no inevitability or intention. There is chance. just a dice game ...
But Do you think the multiverse hypothesis is science ???????
Oky it is defended by many quite respectable scientists. A large number of physicists believe that the multiverse really exists.
To be scientific, a theory must allow predictions verifiable and if the theory of the multiverse offers none, on what basis can we establish that it is science ????????
The multiverse theory was not conceived because we have evidence of the existence of billions of universes, of which we actually have no clue, but only as a "trick" to avoid accepting that the incredible precision of our own universe of life constitutes proof of cosmic intention (God)
Enough for me, now I want to summarize the book:
Chapter 1 : a broad overview of the topic that doesn’t require you to leave your armchair.
Chapter 2: some notions from information and complexity theory. Many of these notions, such as complexity, and emergence are still new enough that there is no widespread agreement on their meaning.
-Information : an observer dependent thing)
-Complexity theory :the measure of all things being the number of bytes needed to describe something perfectly
-Emergence :the notion that something is more than the sum of the parts from which it constructed.
Chapter 3: the notion of an ensemble theory of everything. the ensemble of all possible worlds described by quantum mechanics is the Multiverse. However, other ensembles do exist. The speed of light, and the finite age of the universe, means we can only see a certain distance into space. Yet we have no reason to suppose space stops at that boundary. In an infinite space, the same arrangement of molecules and atoms that make up our planet and everything on it at this moment in time will reappear somewhere else.
Functionalism, the idea that our consciousness depends only upon the material arrangement of our
brains and bodies implies not only that there is another “you” out there thinking exactly the same thoughts as you, but also that because the other “you” is indistinguishable, your consciousness is actually simultaneously implemented by both copies. When one copy is killed, and the other lives, your conscious experience must follow.
chapter 4: To attach a meaning to descriptions, observers need to embedded in a temporal dimension. In order to have a bit of information, one needs to perceive a difference between two states, and a time dimension separating those two states. This state of affairs is the TIME
Chapter 5 : the Anthropic Principle.
Chapter 6 : Darwin’s theory of evolution.
Chapter 7 : the author took seriously the suggestion that observed reality is the result of an evolutionary process
Chapter 8 revisits the quantum theory of immortality (A VERY HARD CHAPTER)
Finally Chapter 9 is about consciousness and free will.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ✔ (S=0) i have an answer, thanks Russell K. Standish 🙏🏻
This book is about math and physics so forget everything you saw in Spider-Man 3 or Doctor Strange. let's start shall we 😎
In Borges’s Library of Babel, Jorge imagined a library so vast it contained not only all the books ever published with fewer than 1.3 million letters, but also all possible books with fewer than 1.3 million characters typed by monkeys hitting keys on a typewriter.
while reading THE LIBRARY OF BABEL I said to myself 'Jorge Luis' you are a genius this is the the best imaginary model of the Multiverse.
Otherwise I'm a big fan of the ANTHROPIC PRINCIPLE (the improbable conjunction between a series of laws and constants of nature, and their very great precision specific to generating life.)
What I would like to know is how science explains this precision so incredible?
Well, the answer is the Multiverse.🏆
According to the multiverse theory, there is not just one universe, there are billions and billions of them, each with its own laws and constants. In our universe, the omega is point fifty-nine zeros, in another universe it will be point fifty-eight zeros, and so on. Each universe has its own laws and constants, with values varying from case to case. Considering that there are billions and billions of different universes, it is statistically inevitable that some have found the right formula for creating life. There is therefore no inevitability or intention. There is chance. just a dice game ...
But Do you think the multiverse hypothesis is science ???????
Oky it is defended by many quite respectable scientists. A large number of physicists believe that the multiverse really exists.
To be scientific, a theory must allow predictions verifiable and if the theory of the multiverse offers none, on what basis can we establish that it is science ????????
The multiverse theory was not conceived because we have evidence of the existence of billions of universes, of which we actually have no clue, but only as a "trick" to avoid accepting that the incredible precision of our own universe of life constitutes proof of cosmic intention (God)
Enough for me, now I want to summarize the book:
Chapter 1 : a broad overview of the topic that doesn’t require you to leave your armchair.
Chapter 2: some notions from information and complexity theory. Many of these notions, such as complexity, and emergence are still new enough that there is no widespread agreement on their meaning.
-Information : an observer dependent thing)
-Complexity theory :the measure of all things being the number of bytes needed to describe something perfectly
-Emergence :the notion that something is more than the sum of the parts from which it constructed.
Chapter 3: the notion of an ensemble theory of everything. the ensemble of all possible worlds described by quantum mechanics is the Multiverse. However, other ensembles do exist. The speed of light, and the finite age of the universe, means we can only see a certain distance into space. Yet we have no reason to suppose space stops at that boundary. In an infinite space, the same arrangement of molecules and atoms that make up our planet and everything on it at this moment in time will reappear somewhere else.
Functionalism, the idea that our consciousness depends only upon the material arrangement of our
brains and bodies implies not only that there is another “you” out there thinking exactly the same thoughts as you, but also that because the other “you” is indistinguishable, your consciousness is actually simultaneously implemented by both copies. When one copy is killed, and the other lives, your conscious experience must follow.
chapter 4: To attach a meaning to descriptions, observers need to embedded in a temporal dimension. In order to have a bit of information, one needs to perceive a difference between two states, and a time dimension separating those two states. This state of affairs is the TIME
Chapter 5 : the Anthropic Principle.
Chapter 6 : Darwin’s theory of evolution.
Chapter 7 : the author took seriously the suggestion that observed reality is the result of an evolutionary process
Chapter 8 revisits the quantum theory of immortality (A VERY HARD CHAPTER)
Finally Chapter 9 is about consciousness and free will.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ✔ (S=0) i have an answer, thanks Russell K. Standish 🙏🏻
January 14, 2024
This is kind of a reference book for ideas useful in thinking about the multiverse. Some of it required more math than I have, so I docked it a star for that. A good science writer should be able to make a point with words, not equations.
January 31, 2019
First of all, I must point out that this is a proper book written by a knowledgeable man, not some quantum woo mumbo-jumbo, excessively dumbed-down popular science or pointless philosophizing from an arm-chair philosopher who has never solved an integral in his/her life.
With that out of the way, allow me to express some criticism of the book. Although I do admire the author's balls for putting some insane, albeit plausible ideas out there, I couldn't help myself but to cringe at some of them. I really couldn't digest the use of formal systems and obscure modal logic to pull seemingly concrete conclusions out of one's proverbial ass while blatantly disregarding the real (whatever that means) world. Furthermore, I find the strong/absolute self-sampling assumption patently absurd. Related to that, I shuddered at the sloppy use of the anthropic principle, it felt like a hammer in search of a nail and it doesn't really help to repair the image the infamous principle already has in the research community. But I did like the derivation of QM principles, although I'll have to think about it some more.
All in all, it's a good read and the author himself doesn't necessarily agree with all the things that I found problematic... even if it's far from clear at times.
As always, I don't pretend to be unbiased. I'm a theoretical physicist and my knowledge is not unlimited.
With that out of the way, allow me to express some criticism of the book. Although I do admire the author's balls for putting some insane, albeit plausible ideas out there, I couldn't help myself but to cringe at some of them. I really couldn't digest the use of formal systems and obscure modal logic to pull seemingly concrete conclusions out of one's proverbial ass while blatantly disregarding the real (whatever that means) world. Furthermore, I find the strong/absolute self-sampling assumption patently absurd. Related to that, I shuddered at the sloppy use of the anthropic principle, it felt like a hammer in search of a nail and it doesn't really help to repair the image the infamous principle already has in the research community. But I did like the derivation of QM principles, although I'll have to think about it some more.
All in all, it's a good read and the author himself doesn't necessarily agree with all the things that I found problematic... even if it's far from clear at times.
As always, I don't pretend to be unbiased. I'm a theoretical physicist and my knowledge is not unlimited.
September 12, 2025
There are many interesting ideas regarding what the theory of everything (or nothing, according to the book) might look like, the anthropic principle, self-sampling assumption, and multiverse, etc. It's hard to follow the math at times, but I like the fact that it is not hidden away, like in many popular science books.
February 10, 2023
This book has many of the ideas of Max Tegmark and others developed about the multiverse and the Mathematical Universe Hypothesis Standish and Tegmark worked with these ideas around the same time. This book is more Many-worlds interpretation and computer science focused but it has its own twists and turns and is based on solid physics this isn't Deepak Chopra this is serious and even has some serious equations from QM and Thermodynamics, combinatorics, and computer science. Inspired by Borges Library of Babel this is one of the early multiverse speculative books and it is a wild ride but a rigorous ride. Excellent book.
Update 2/9/2023 Uses QM and the Many Worlds interpretation as an opener into the idea of quantum immortality and contemplates the nature of an infinite universe and computation and information theory to argue just like the collection of all random possible bit strings would have no information it would be equivalent to nothing or no information. Our universe is a subset of random possible bit strings that describe us and our copies as well. So by taking a small subset of nothing we get something. Of course, it goes into anthropic reasoning and solves problems of an infinite universe with an infinite number of observers some of whom will make freak observations (Boltzmann Brains) by talking instead of observers but instead observer moments which may help with freak observers any leaves a solution open to minimize the problems of freak observers. Anyway good stuff.
Worth a look I am sure the field has moved on from the nineties when this book was published.
Update 2/9/2023 Uses QM and the Many Worlds interpretation as an opener into the idea of quantum immortality and contemplates the nature of an infinite universe and computation and information theory to argue just like the collection of all random possible bit strings would have no information it would be equivalent to nothing or no information. Our universe is a subset of random possible bit strings that describe us and our copies as well. So by taking a small subset of nothing we get something. Of course, it goes into anthropic reasoning and solves problems of an infinite universe with an infinite number of observers some of whom will make freak observations (Boltzmann Brains) by talking instead of observers but instead observer moments which may help with freak observers any leaves a solution open to minimize the problems of freak observers. Anyway good stuff.
Worth a look I am sure the field has moved on from the nineties when this book was published.
February 17, 2020
Lots of interesting ideas presented in this book. To be honest, I didn't have the time or stamina to follow all of the mathematical reasoning. The formatting in the kindle edition didn't make this easier (formulas and spacing made things impossible to read). I would recommend reading Our Mathematical Universe by Max Tegmark for someone who is interested in these ideas (in fact, I think I found this book in Tegmark's bibliography).
March 22, 2014
I read this as a follow up to Max Tegmark's The Mathematical Universe. Unfortunately, this became difficult going when the discussion started to include math equations. These were barely legible in the ebook edition I was reading and it became too distracting for me to continue. The formatting in general was poor as well, as there was no functioning table of contents and the footnotes were run on, making them hard to read. I hate it when that happens!
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews