In Einsteins achtertuin

by Amanda Gefter, Ingrid Ottevanger (Translator), Wim Scherpenisse (Translator)

In een Chinees restaurant ergens in een buitenwijk van Philadelphia, stelt een vader een ogenschijnlijk eenvoudige vraag aan zijn vijftienjarige dochter: ‘Hoe zou je “niets” definiëren?’. Het daaropvolgende gesprek was het begin van een jarenlange queeste waarin vader en dochter samen op zoek gingen naar het antwoord op de grootste mysteries van het universum. In Einsteins achtertuin is het unieke verhaal van een hechte vader-dochterrelatie, verweven met de meest geavanceerde ideeën uit de natuurkunde.

Voordat Amanda Gefter een gerenommeerd wetenschapsjournalist werd, werkte ze bij een trouwtijdschrift. Ze misbruikte haar perskaart om samen met haar vader natuurkundecongressen te bezoeken en in discussie te gaan met een aantal van de grootste denkers van het moment: John Wheeler, Leonard Susskind, Ed Witten en zelfs met Stephen Hawking.

Het meest ongelofelijke aan dit waargebeurde verhaal is dat vader en dochter daadwerkelijk onderdeel werden van een van de belangrijkste discussies die in de natuurkunde gevoerd worden. Ons begrip van ‘de werkelijkheid’ blijkt in de afgelopen jaren radicaal veranderd te zijn en heeft inmiddels vormen aangenomen die zelfs Einstein in zijn stoutste dromen niet heeft voorzien. De huidige theorieën lijken er namelijk op te wijzen dat we allemaal letterlijk in ons eigen universum wonen en dat werkelijkheid dus afhankelijk is van het perspectief van de kijker.

Amanda beschrijft ook haar persoonlijke ontwikkeling: hoe ze langzaam maar zeker uit het universum dat ze met haar vader deelt stapt en haar eigen universum begint te creëren. Je zou het ook opgroeien kunnen noemen. Haar stijl is zowel hilarisch als ontroerend, zowel nuchter als meeslepend. Na het lezen van dit boek zal je kijk op jezelf en op het universum zal nooit meer hetzelfde zijn.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Physics, Philosophy, Biography, Memoir, History

552 pages, Paperback

First published January 14, 2014

About the author

I am a physics and cosmology writer. My first book, Trespassing on Einstein's Lawn, was published by Random House in January 2014. It's the story of my quest with my father to figure out the nature of ultimate reality. You know, *that* old story.

I'm a consultant for New Scientist magazine, where I formerly served as Books & Arts editor and founded CultureLab. My writing has been featured in Nautilus, New Scientist, Scientific American, Sky and Telescope, Astronomy.com and The Philadelphia Inquirer. I studied the History and Philosophy of Science at the London School of Economics and was a 2012-13 Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT. I live in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where I'm staring at the blank pages that are to be book #2...

Reviews

[Lisa Nikolits · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating, surprisingly gripping read! I say surprisingly because I wouldn’t generally expect quantum mechanics, quarks, boson particles, string theory and the like to hold me hostage for an entire weekend of reading but I couldn’t put this book down! I’m no physicist (not even remotely) but I found the book to be accessible and clear. I have always been interested in the topic but I had never found a text that I could understand, relate to and enjoy, like this one. The memoir format worked well to create a personalized structure within which the (potentially) dry facts could be housed. The main character’s relationship with her parents, and her father in particular, was very heart-warming. I learned a lot from this book and it was refreshing to engage with a text that sparked my brain cells into some real thinking!

[Matt Kimball · Rating 5 out of 5]

Trespassing on Einstein's Lawn is a braid of three strands of narrative -- one part conceptual tour of modern physics, one part philosophical rumination on the metaphysical implications of the pure weirdness that is modern physics, and one part memoir and love-letter to the author's father, with all three modes compelling throughout.

Gefter's journey starts in a Chinese restaurant at the age of fifteen, as her father asks her, "How would you define nothing?" Not content to keep the discussion small, Amanda and her father wonder what it really would mean if the Universe were filled with nothingness -- a completely homogeneous state in which the things we think of as something (Matter? Spacetime? Quarks? Strings?) aren't, or perhaps cease to be meaningful concepts when in a boundaryless soup of blended Universe. Could this homogeneous state, the "H-State", be some sort of clue to the origin of existence?

From this seed, Amanda's journey begins. Early on, she poses as a journalist at a physics conference, simply to get access to the best minds in physics so they might answer a few questions about the mechanisms of how something could come from nothing. Later, her charades become reality as she is hired to write physics coverage for New Scientist magazine. In each stage of her journey, she interweaves the principles of modern physics with her own life story. Early on, she explains special and general relativity, followed by Thomas Young's mind-bending double-slit light experiment. A few chapters further, she contrasts the philosophical concept of scientific realism with its competing philosophies while in the same chapter narrating her battle unseen rats -- rats which may or may not exist -- in her tiny London flat. And later, we get deep into modern physics with Hawking radiation, the difference in perspective between an observer crossing the event horizon of a black hole with one stationed safely outside the event horizon, d-brane theory and the holographic principle, all raising new and more disturbing questions about what reality is, exactly.

It's an exhilarating ride, and though it's deeply rooted in science, one might even call it a spiritual journey. Certainly some of the biggest questions about life, the universe, and the meaning of it all are raised, and very speculatively and tentatively suggested to have answers. For this reader, it was even a little comforting to work through it all. I've been saddened by the idea of the entropy death of the universe ever since I learned of the concept, even though the timescale for such an event is so remote as to be comically irrelevant to my life, and I've been deeply troubled by some interpretations of quantum mechanics which seem to imply a special role for consciousness in physics, and I was actually assuaged and had my mood lifted by Gefter's vision here in relation to both of these concepts, going into my exact reasoning here would be mild spoilers, so I'll avoid them and let other readers experience the journey on their own.

I'd unreservedly recommend Gefter's book to folks with an interest in modern physics and a bit of a bent towards philosophy. As one of the many physicists mentioned in the book suggests, perhaps philosophy is too important to be left only to the philosophers.

[Jon Schull · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really a wonderful book on many levels. Wonderful writing, wonderful people, wonderful wonder, and (apparently) a wonderful universe.

I wrote her a fan letter, which I almost never do....

Dear Ms Gefter,

Congratulations on your book. I enjoyed and admired it tremendously and look forward to the next volume of what I hope will be a continuing saga. Your work is not done!

Although I now work on human computer interaction in Rochester, NY, I taught Introductory and Biological Psychology at Haverford College from 1980-1992, I frequently visit family there, and of course the Hunan restaurant is a long time favorite. It so happens that in those days, I wrote my only other fan-letter to an author; I suggested to Freeman Dyson that the problem of unknowable other universes was similar to the problem of other minds. You're in good company in my book!

Needless to say, I didn't understand much of what you discuss, but I do have a few questions / comments that might be useful. I realize that these may be coals to Newcastle, so I'll be brief. But I'd be happy to discuss further if they are useful to you.

Am I correct that the zen-like summary of your story is that "the only observer-independent invariant is that there is no observer-independent invariant"? If so, the paradox might be telling us something. What kind of gauge theory could reconcile the horns of that dilemma?

Are you familiar with Gregory Bateson and his discussions of information theory? If not, I think you will enjoy Steps to an Ecology of Mind, especially the metalogues, and the Korzybski lecture. Here's my own gloss on the Korzybski lecture, to try to make the relevance to your work clear. (It's been about 20 years since I pondered the original text, so forgive any inaccuracies you may find when you get back to the orginal source.)

Korzybski is famous for his observation that "the map is not the territory", and that maps (and maps of maps) are the only "things" we can know. Bateson (who participated in the Macy conferences that gave birth to information theory and systems theory) is famous for talking about information as "a difference that makes a difference". He points out that bits (and patterns which are collections of differences) are dimensionless non-things that nonetheless can capture observations of differences in the territory. When those differences are organized into patterns, they become maps (which preserve relationships in the territory, but should not be confused with the territory, in part because many different maps can be made of the same ultimately unknowable territory).

Implicit in Bateson's writing (I think) but never articulated, is this further extrapolation. The difference a difference makes is dependent on the position of the observer. A red light means "stop" at an intersection, but means something else in th red light district. Patterns--the differences made, the maps we perceive--are in the eye of the beholder. There is a theory of meaning in there. And thanks to your book, I realize there might be a theory of cosmology in there somewhere too. (Or a pony.)

The other book I want to make sure you're familiar with is the Laws of Form by G. Spencer Brown. Maddeningly cryptic at times, it is all about logical divisions and how they spawn a universe of meaning (or structure, or something), which always collapses into true or false. It might be worth revisiting with quantum logic, which I do not pretend to understand.


Finally, I thought you might enjoy seeing how the computer language Python deals with a few of the fundamentals you discuss.

In python a simple data structure is a list, denoted by two closed brackets: e.g., [1,2,3]
# This is a comment

# Here is an empty list
emptyList = [] # a single equal = assigns a value

# The length of an empty list is 0
len([]) == 0
#True #a double equal == assesses equality: thus, is the length of [ ] equal to 0?

# But the empty set is not nothing. It's greater than False and it's greater than True and its greater than any mere number
False < True < 100 < []
#True

# And you can indeed build up numbers and ordinality from them
len( [[]] ) == 1
#True

len([ [], [] ] ) ==2
#True

[ [], [], [] ] > [ [], [] ]
#True

Thanks again to you and your father for creating such wonderful and human work.

[Elnur “Filbala” · Rating 5 out of 5]

What is ultimately real? — Amanda Gefter asks in her book and offers the answer: only what is invariant in any frame of reference is ultimately real. She composes the list of possible invariants, among them particles, fundamental forces, spacetime, and even the universe itself. During her quest for the ultimate reality she crosses every one of them out of the list.

I have to say that I found this book fascinating. Its ideas of radical observer-dependency — that nothing is invariant and ultimately real — deeply resonated both with my worldview as well as with ideas and sources I’ve been coming across.

The only thing that confused me is that the author considers herself an ontic structural realist. Does this mean that she believes in some invariant, observer-independent structure out there? In that case we end up with realism: the world is external and fixed, has certain inherent structure, which we discover via experiment and math, describe with theories which can succeed each other, but nevertheless are asymptotically more and more accurate descriptions of the world as it is. In her book, Gefter refers to the ideas of eminent physicist John Archibald Wheeler, but I don’t think he shared this vision. After all, when all invariants are gone, is the structure what is to stay? In absence of space, time and even the universe, the structure of what? Isn’t a structure, being part of the reality, meant to be a result of the interaction between an observer and the world?

I’m wondering whether the author encountered the matter of metaphor in her studies. Having a degree in Philosophy of Science, Gefter is probably aware of growing recognition of metaphor’s role in reasoning. Metaphor is not just a figure of speech anymore, not mere ornament of language, but a cornerstone of human cognition that defines how we think, act and communicate. All our abstract concepts, including the most fundamental physical ones, have been shown to be metaphorical. Theodore L. Brown in his book “Making Truth: Metaphor in Science” clearly illustrates how progress in science is largely a succession of metaphors. In “Physics as Metaphor,” Roger S. Jones shows space, time, matter and number to be the “cardinal metaphors” of physics, the very glue that holds it all together.

Yes, of course, ontic structural realist could say, but metaphors are just stories, our ways of understanding the world. Stories are different descriptions of reality and shouldn’t be mistaken for different realities. Stories can change, but the underlying reality, its mathematical structure always remains the same. The philosopher and conceptual metaphors theorist Mark Johnson would argue: “It is often said that mature theories will use only mathematics and formal logic, thereby supposedly transcending metaphor. But both logic and mathematics are based on large numbers of conceptual metaphors that define their most fundamental concepts and operations. Mathematizing science doesn’t eliminate metaphor.” “Where Mathematics Comes From” is a comprehensive illustration of mathematics’ metaphorical foundations.

There is a large and growing evidence of metaphor’s constitutive role in philosophical and scientific thinking. There are voices calling for the view that all knowledge is metaphorical. More radically still, some thinkers, including famous scientist Gregory Bateson, give metaphor not only epistemological, but also ontological status, viewing it as a feature of both human mind and nature itself. The most recent and quite remarkable example of such approach to metaphor is an ambitious and thought-provoking book “Missing Link: The Evolution of Metaphor and the Metaphor of Evolution” by Canadian poet and critic Jeffery Donaldson.

But probably the most original ideas in this camp belong to the philosopher Cathy J. Wheeler. In the short article “Question With No Answer, Or: Reality as Literalism and as Metaphor” she offers her vision: reality is what the universe appears to be through its sensitivities (by which she presumably means observer-participators). “The thoughts, experiences, and images that take shape within them are reality itself.”

It’s strikingly similar to notions of genesis by observership and participatory universe — the core ideas of what I believe was John Wheeler’s vision. This is probably some kind of synchronicity, as Cathy Wheeler and her famous namesake are not related in any way.

Similar ideas can be found in other authors. Among them: Schrödinger’s “The world is given to me only once, not one existing and one perceived. Subject and object are only one;” Skolimowski’s “Outer walls of the cosmos are the inner walls of the mind;” and the concluding thought of Gefter’s book: “Existence is what nothing looks like from the inside.”

There is one crucial thing, however, that makes Cathy Wheeler’s approach different — metaphor. Being a circular relationship between the universe and its sensitivities, reality, according to her, is itself metaphorical: “Metaphor is no longer a contained and unreal product of human minds, but an act of the universe itself, bringing together things that have never before mingled or producing new juxtapositions and interactions among old companions. This sort of metaphor results in reality, not unreality. Any thought or image that takes form within a sensitivity is reality, whether this particular sense of reality lasts for a millisecond or a billion years, whether it occurs within one sensitivity or many.”

Thus, for Cathy Wheeler, metaphor is not a way of the separated mind to understand independent, single reality. As the line between observer and observed is blurring, reality and our perception of it become one and the same. Metaphor then is a way how various aspects of the universe interact, manifesting as definite reality. “Reality as metaphor is multiple and mutable. The universe keeps coming together in different configurations, each one producing a sense of reality ‘as if’ this is how the world is.”

The universe was a machine yesterday, it’s the Big Bang expansion today, it may be a hologram or information tomorrow. Or a simulation, maybe. But whatever it is, we should remember that, as Norman O. Brown said, “all that is, is metaphor.” No matter whether in epistemological or ontological sense.

There can be no theory of everything. No final destination from where we can say: “This is how the world really is.” Cathy Wheeler put it better than I could: “All reality is metaphorical […]. The universe takes form ‘as if’ there are certain things that do not ‘really’ exist, or that are [appearances] of other things, or that are mistakes, as well as ‘as if’ certain things are simply how things are.”

Of course, taking reality as metaphor is a metaphor itself. A strange loop. We never get beyond metaphor. We never get to ultimate reality. We never get outside. What we call “outside” is another part of “inside” (and both, we must not forget, are metaphors, a consequence of our understanding of space, our very being in the world). Like Ouroboros biting its own tail, we can’t escape Gödel’s spell. We shouldn’t. Instead, we can celebrate metaphor as the universe “realizing” itself — coming into existence as being some, but not the only way — through us. M is for metaphor?

[Peter Blom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Heerlijk boek over de zoektocht van een beginnend wetenschappelijk journalist naar de vraag "wat is werkelijk". Haar lijst wordt steeds korter tot er niets overblijft. Niets is invariant tov de waarnemer. Maar welke waarnemer? Ikzelf? Een god-waarnemer? Ieder zijn eigen wekelijkheid? Is alles uiteindelijk niets? De antwoorden op deze grens van fysica en filosofie zijn duidelijk nog niet gevonden.
Laat je niet weerhouden door de slecht vertaalde titel (trespassing geeft aan dat Einstein zo zijn bedenkingen gehad zou hebben).

[Jan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amanda Gefter is cute, charming, and whip smart. Provoked by her father's question about "Nothing" at age 15, she went on, through massive amounts of private reading in physics, philosophy, and cosmology, to become an amazing science journalist. This book tells the story of that journey.

I needed the glossary at the end of the book. The definitions are written in a concise, accessible fashion, so it really did help me understand the theories she explored over the years. Even with the glossary handy, I needed the other recent readings I've done on the topics she covers in order to obliquely grasp the discussion.

So, can a person read it just for the story of Gefter's journey? Probably not, but I can tell you all that physics and philosophy goes down a whole lot easier when embedded in the story of a young girl's quirky journey to an unlikely career outcome. Without a doubt this woman is smart, but she is also a great example of becoming brilliant by diligently pursuing knowledge and understanding.

I reserve my five-star ratings for books I will press upon my friends, insisting they MUST read this. I am pressing this on my husband so he can talk about it with me. I think I will also press it on my son. But I doubt I'd strengthen bonds by pressing it on many others. So, an "advised" five stars.

[Malli · Rating 2 out of 5]

A book that started out with a great deal of hope but petered out in disappointing fashion for me. Amanda Gefter seemed like an approachable, science enthusiast desperate to learn the theory of universe creation. The books starts off well - her father's and her love for physics shines through and the first couple of chapters are charming, endearing and lucid. But after that, she loses the plot. Her writing gets turgid and at times condescending (her frequent references to her dad, mom and labrador do nothing to the plot other than providing brief respite from her poor prose). I am a determined reader when it comes to technical stuff related to cosmology - but I found her style arcane and poor. Would recommend a miss. There is better stuff out there.

[James Easterson · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books I've read in quite awhile. This book takes you down the rabbit-hole of cosmology and theoretical physics via the trippy world of quantum mechanics. First of all I'll say that I am not convinced of all the conclusions here but I accept it as a valid argument and my differences lay mostly due to my own biases and philosophies which I see no reason to abandon at this point. Secondly I will state the this book covers the all current theories exceedingly well and provided a description of them I have found no where else and has greatly improved my understanding of them. For the most part I kept up with this book fairly well, though it did get beyond me at points due to terminologies and some theories on physics. The author does an amazing job, and her story captivates! I could not recommend this book more highly! An awesome read! No, I don't accept it all, but so what. That's just me. Personally, I think ultimate reality is a bit deeper than physics alone and think that each observer is just part of a greater whole, rather than the whole is each observer dependent.

[Maggie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book, as I really loved Amanda Gefter’s NYT modern love column and I liked the premise, but unfortunately I could not. The New York Time’s book review from 2014 puts my thoughts into better words than I ever could, but basically, unless you have a degree in physics, her narrative is fairly impenetrable. She assumes too much prior knowledge of very complex ideas of theoretical physics and cosmology. Rather than breaking down these ideas into digestible concepts that the average reader might have a chance of understanding, she instead narrates the rabbit hole she dives into as she seeks to find her own answers, but doesn’t provide enough background for the reader to successfully accompany her.

I didn’t actually finish the boom — I abandoned it on page 141, as I was tired of feeling like I needed a science dictionary and an advanced degree in physics to understand half of what she was writing.

[Annefey · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a perfect, delightful, brilliant book! I wish I could give 6 stars. If my library was on fire then I would run in to save this book. OK, and a couple of other books. And the rest. I admit, it's more a manner of speech.

I bought this book because someone donated it to my favorite charity bookshop. Thank you so much, kind stranger! How did you manage to let it go though?

[Jen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow !!! I'm so impressed with this book. I came to it for a little info on John Wheeler, and I found that and so much more. Anyone concerned with the nature of reality and interested in the physics behind the search would enjoy this.

[D.L. Morrese · Rating 5 out of 5]

What is real? Really real? Real for everyone everywhere? This is essentially the philosophical question Amanda Gefter is exploring in this truly unique book. It's part memoir, part philosophy, and part science. It's a narration of her personal quest to find an answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything. It's a story about how she finagles a job as a science journalist in order to talk to some of the most eminent people working in theoretical physics today, and it's an exploration of the metaphysical implications of some of their ideas. (Reviewers note to reader: Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that deals with the ultimate nature of reality. It's kind of like real physics, especially theoretical physics, but without all the messy math and testability requirements.)
I write (soft) science fiction, but I'm not a scientist. Relativity seemed rational enough to me (after some mental gymnastics), but many of the implications of quantum mechanics boggled my mind. It could make accurate predictions, but it never really made sense. It was like a superposition of 'true' and 'bat-crap crazy'. After joining Amanda on her search in the pages of this book, I feel I have a better intuitive grasp of entanglement, wave-particle duality, the uncertainty principle, and entropy than those I possessed before. My shaky understanding may still be dead wrong, of course, but at least I have some framework to give these ideas structure now.
This would have been enough for me to proclaim this a great science book for nonscientists. But it has more.
She shows us some of the major physicists of our time not as embodiments of their ideas but as real people who interact with the world around them much as we of lesser intellect do. They have personalities, egos, disagreements, and quirks. They are real people who also just happen to be brilliant scientists. As she related her interviews with them, I thought about young students who might be reading this and drawing inspiration from it. We sometimes put great achievers on pedestals, implying that greatness is out of reach for us 'normal' people. Gefter brings them down to earth, showing us their humanity and thereby reminding us that they are not so different from the rest of us.
I think this book also reminds us of the tenuous relationship between theory, experiment, and the 'reality' behind them. Experiments yield data and theories provide beautiful equations, but what are they telling us about the underlying reality (assuming there is some)? This seems largely open to interpretation, at least on the quantum level. Yeah, the math works, but what does it MEAN? Is the 'thing' found 'real' or is it just a data point that tells us about a relationship with other data points from a particular point of view? Apparently, the answers depend on the questions asked, and if those answers seem contradictory, it may be because some of our underlying assumptions are wrong.
Some books about science suggest that scientists are simply fine tuning, adding details to the standard model, and working out a few remaining unknowns, such as the nature of dark energy or whatever. Trespassing on Einstein's Lawn, I think, is telling us something entirely different. There are still a great number of things to learn and new theories needed to make sense of them. Science is not almost done. It has barely begun. There remains much to discover and understand.
I found this book informative, thought provoking, and entertaining. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in science and philosophy.

[Ivana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ten freakin' stars!! Give this woman a medal.

I can't explain how much I enjoyed this book. Amanda Gefter is such a talented writer, and her ability to distill the most complicated aspects of physics into a book that non-scientists can actually grasp is nothing short of remarkable.
She is smart, funny, succinct, curious, bold, courageous....the list goes on and on.

As someone who is obsessed with physics (and quantum physics in particular), this book is a must have, and one that will be re-read over and over as new quantum physics discoveries happen.

Her relationship with her father, who is the reason she embarked on this journey to begin with, brought me to tears. I really enjoyed getting to know them through these pages.
Also, I am jealous AF that she got to meet the smartest physicist of our time....you go, you badass girl!

[Annie · Rating 5 out of 5]

OVERVIEW

This is going to be a long review, but there’s SO much information packed into this average-sized book, it’s absolutely wild. The first section will just be a normal review; the second, much longer section will trace out what I found to be the most interesting, mind-blowing parts of this book and is really just for my own future reference.

It’s a hard book to categorize: it’s part memoir, part popular science (albeit awfully *dense* popular science - the average sentence goes like this: “By spotting the invariant in Einstein’s equations - the spacetime interval that holds steady through Lorentz transformnations from one inertial frame to the next - we can glimpse the true reality behind appearances”). It’s by no means an easy read if you’re not a physicist, but put in the work and it’s a highly rewarding one.

Here’s the premise: a man sits his teenage daughter down at a restaurant in Philadelphia and says, “How would you define nothing? How can you get something from nothing? … and do you think that could explain how the universe began?”

“Isn’t that physics?” she asks. “I’m not even taking physics.”

Her dad replies, “Well, I think we should figure it out.”

His daughter thinks, ‘We should figure it out’ - it wasn’t the kind of thing a parent says to a child. It was the kind of thing a person says to another person… It occurred to me that the best gift a parent can give a child is a mystery.

That mystery drove the author to pursue a career in science journalism - with her father often accompanying her to conferences, she wormed her way into the world of theoretical physics. This book discusses what she’s learned, and what some of the current thinking is in the world of theoretical physics.

This book has also convinced me that theoretical physics is actually philosophy of physics (which, as a former philosophy student, is a highly gratifying realization). It is handled in the same way as much of classical philosophy, in ways that absolutely gobsmacked me - as a philo major, I avoided any and all science like the plague. Why didn’t anyone ever tell me they were the SAME THING? I would have taken all the physics!

See, in this world on the outer edges of scientific understanding, we can only go so far with empirical evidence. At some point, we have to interpret and contextualize that seemingly contradictory, seemingly impossible evidence and spread it out and construct a theory of how these fit together. And we do that… mostly with conjecture. With stratified logic. With philosophy. I will fight anyone who disagrees with me on this.


THE PHYSICS

The author’s quest is to find out how you can get “something” (the universe) from “nothing” - and what those words even mean. What’s the world made out of? What’s real?

Something is only real, the author realizes, if it’s invariant (invariant means the same in every reference frame - i.e. not dependent on the observer). She compares this to someone seeing a rainbow - in some sense, it does exist (it’s water droplets plus the sunlight refracting off them) but it’s observer dependent - you can see it from your perspective, but move somewhere else and you might no longer see it. It exists in a real way to YOU, but it’s ultimately viewer-dependent, subjective - (and as it turns out, so are most of the things we think exist). But the subjective isn’t real, if it changes as soon as your view shifts. So to find ultimate reality, first you have to eliminate everything observer-dependent until we’re left with what is truly invariant.

That’s a hard task. Because, as Gefter discovers, physics can’t be described from an “objective” or “God’s eye” point of view - physics can only measure things in relation to other things. There must be an “observer” for physics to be “true” (observer doesn’t necessarily mean a conscious person - it means a frame of reference). That doesn’t mean it’s subjective, though - the laws of physics IS true from that frame of reference. But only from that frame of reference. In short: “we each have our own universe. We just don’t notice because there’s so much overlap.”

Take, for instance, the double slit experiment and its partner, the delayed choice experiment (a truly unsettling result). Basically, the double slit experiment involves shooting a particle (say, a photon - a particle of light - or an electron. Pick your poison, it doesn’t matter). Take a box with two tiny slits that lead to another box. Shoot a bunch of particles at the wall of the box - most will hit the wall and rebound, but some will go through the two slits. On the other side, on the opposite wall, those ripples will create a pattern (called an interference pattern) of where those particles landed. Those photons will end up in certain places as a result of the pattern - most of the photons will end up in certain places (call these Places X), and very few photons in other, less likely places (Places Y). You can actually see that if you were to conduct this with water and make ripples in the water - the water that goes through the two slits will make this interference pattern on the other side. Weirdly, however, even if you only shoot ONE photon at a time, through a single slit . . . it will still land on the other side in the same interference pattern (ie it’s a lot more likely to land in Places X). Even though it’s the only moving particle and isn’t actually interfering with any other particles. Somehow it KNOWS how it would be behaving if there were lots of other particles being shot through the slits, and chooses its path accordingly!

The prevailing interpretation of the experiment (the Copenhagan interpretation) is that the particle exists as a probability, not something “real” with a specific location. A particle is only its wave function (a distribution of probabilities). It’s like the universe is allowing all possibilities to exist simultaneously, but doesn’t choose which one is reality until somebody observes and measures it - and weirder, it seems like all of those possibilities, all the possible paths the particle could take, all those realities where the particle does take those other paths, actually interact with each other (making Places X more likely places for the particle to end up than Places Y).

So we know where the particle is when we shoot it out, and we know where it is when it lands on the other side - but what happens in between? Where does the particle go? And by the way, which slit does it go through anyway, since there are two? Can we measure where the particle is AS it goes through the slit? Well, this is the delayed choice experiment, and this is the truly weird part. When we measure which slit a particle goes through… it STOPS LANDING IN THE INTERFERENCE PATTERN. It just lands straight through the slit to the other side, on the left or the right in clumps depending on which slit it goes through.

And oddly, it even seems to retroactively “know” if we’re measuring it or not. If we send it through the slit, measure it to see which slit it goes through, but then have that information scrambled after the fact - AFTER it has already splatted on the wall (so that we never actually find out which side it went through, but it splatted on the wall BEFORE we scrambled that information), it lands in the interference pattern. So it’s not the mechanics of measurement that shifts things - it’s somehow, spookily, the fact that we know which slit it goes through. Our KNOWLEDGE (not even just physical measurement, but our AWARENESS) of which slit it went through changes where it goes. And this seems to have some… backwards causation. As if what happens now (scrambling the information we measured, so that we never find out which slit it went through) can go back in time and CHANGE where the particle ALREADY SPLATTED. That’s insane. That’s insane!

Gefter gets the opportunity to pick one of the greatest minds in physics about this: she asks Stephen Hawking, “Is there really a kind of backward causation taking place?” SH replies: “Observation of final states determines different histories of the universe. However, this backward causality is an angel’s eye view from outside the universe. A worm’s eye view from inside the universe would have the normal causality.”

In other words, Gefter explains, “from outside the universe, where you could see the tangled superposition of possible histories, you could watch an observer in the present select a single past. To the observer here on the inside, though, the past just seemed to be sitting there, as if it had always been there. Of course, Hawking wasn’t actually suggesting that the history of the universe was different for me than it was for my father. But that’s only because the measurments my father and I would use [to calculate the history of the universe] would be exactly the same, given how close we were to each other, astronomically speaking. But if there were some observers off in a distant galaxy whose [frame of reference] barely overlapped with ours, their measurements could feasibly be quite different. If so, their whole cosmic history could be different. It’s not merely that they would calculate a different history; they would literally live in a universe with an objectively different past . . . The history of the universe begfins right now. Nonetheless, it looks like it began 13.7 billion years ago and underwent a brief period of inflation. Observer looks back in time and gives rise to the history of the universe, sees exactly the kind of history needed for the observer to exist in the first place.”

The act of viewing something or measuring from a particular reference point, as a particular observer, changes which reality you live in. So… if reality is different depending on who is observing it … what’s real?

“It was [Carlo] Rovelli who finally found the way through the maze. Indeed, all observers are, from some other reference frame, the observed. Reality is radically observer-dependent. Einstein’s spooky action-at-a-distance was spooky precisely because it was derived from a view from nowhere.”

“If different observers give different accounts of the same sequence of events, then each quantum mechanical description has to be understood as relative to a partciular observer. Thus, a quantum mechanical description of a certain system cannot be taken as an absolute, observer-indepednent description of reality, but rather as a formalization, or codification, of properties of a system relative to a given observer.” In other words: there is no objective reality, reality is ALWAYS only relative to the observer. Perspective is all that matters. “Reality itself isn’t real”!

“Quantum mechanics short-circuits our neurons because it presents yet another paradox: cats have to be alive and dead at the same time, and, given our experience, cats can’t be alive and dead at the same time. Rovelli resolved the paradox by spotting the inherently flawed assumption: that there is a single reality that all observers share. That you can talk about the world from more than one perspective simultaneously. That there’s some invariant way the universe “really is.”

Spoiler alert: there isn’t.

What impact does Rovelli’s realization have on the double slit experiment? “According to one observer [of the experiment], P [that the photon goes through a particular slit] is either true or false. We only violate the law of the excluded middle when we try to view P from more than one reference frame at the same time. Classical logic tells us that the particle passed through one slit or the other. Non-Boolean logic offers a third option: it went through both. But the point is, there’s no observer who can see it go through both. No observer sees both. Look at the slits and you’ll see that it only goes through one. Statements such as ‘The photon travels two paths simultaneously’ is totally misleading and wrong. They assume there’s some singular reality, a way things “actuallly are.” There isn’t. Nature has shown us otherwise. When we compare two possible perspectives of the photon’s path, mistakenly assuming a singular reality that both perspectives share, it LOOKS as though the photon travels two paths simultaneously.”

It’s hard for us to accept that what we experience as reality from our perspective isn’t objective reality, since, after all, we are ALWAYS viewing reality from our own perspective (that’s all we know!), but isn’t that always the case with every new theory that people struggle to wrap their minds around? When people heard the earth was round, Rovelli points out, “it was very complicated conceptually to accept it. How could people in Ausralia be walking upside down? Then eventually people understood, there’s no real up and down; they are relative. And they got used to it. Then it was hard to understand that motion was relative. Then it was hard to understand that simultaneity was relative. And I think quantum mechanics is a step in the same direction.”

Notably, with this theory, the subject can never view itself as the object, or vice versa. They can never be subject and object at the same time. “I am the subject relative to me. I am an object relative to my father. There’s no God’s eye view from which both would appear true at the same time.” Self-measurement is therefore impossible - because “the subject does not belong to the world: rather, it is a limit of the world.” This has to be the case - because if a subject could measure themselves, their perspective (or “light cone” - the sphere of what they can measure, basically) would be absolute; reality would be real and observer-independent, and the double slit experiment shows that’s not the case. Enter my old friend Godel!!! “Everyone had always taken Godel’s theorum to be a deeply pessimistic statement about the limits of knowledge. But in a universe that IS nothing, limits are exactly what we need.”

“If [an observer] could measure itself, collapsing its own wavefunction, then it needn’t exist relative to anything outside itself - in other words, it would simply, inherently exist. It wouldn’t be observer-dependent. It would just BE. In an act of self-affirmation or quite possibly suicide, Schrodinger’s cat would collapse its own wavefunction before anyone opened the box. But quantum mechanics - through the uncertainty relations, complementarity, EPR - has already proven that if we assume that observers inherently exist in some objective, observer-independent way, we get the wrong answers.”

So the universe is nothing and becomes something when you start drawing boundaries - you create an observer (a frame of reference), and the rest the observed. That relationship is what defines the observed and gives it properties (that, without reference point to the observer, it doesn’t have - things only exist in relation to other things). “Now I was beginning to understand what information really was: asymmetry. To register a bit of information, you need two distinguishable states: black vs white, spin up or spin down, 0 or 1. After all, entropy was a measure of missing information, and with entropy comes symmetry. And what’s symmetry? It’s redundancy of description, a redundancy of information. So how do you get information from symmetry? You put a boundary on it. The boundary breaks the symmetry, creating information. But the boundary is observer-dependent, and so is the information it creates.” You can’t observe yourself, light can’t measure itself, because observation necessarily requires being outside a thing. It requires a boundary, something that separates observer from observed. But to the observer they are boundless; their entire universe is contained in themselves.

In sum? Something doesn’t come from nothing - something comes from boundaries in the nothingness. Observers create boundaries (the limit of their perspective) and the act of drawing those boundaries is what makes something exist. (“The boundary of a boundary is zero.”)

So if an observer can’t be observed by themselves, and things only exist in relation to other things… does that observer exist? They do - but only because there are other frames of reference in which that observer is actually the observed. This is Wheeler’s “many minds” interpretation of quantum theory. Wheeler argues that “no single observer is capable of making enough measurements to bring into being all the bits you’d need to build the whole universe - you need multiple observers in order to build reality.” He gives us the following beautiful quote: “I can’t make something out of nothing, and you can’t, but altogether we can.”

Having established that “things” don’t exist except in relation to other things (they can’t be described in any way except in relation to a frame of reference - they have no objective location, time, mass, etc) - what exactly is a thing? If “things” don’t even have an objective substance, what’s it made out of? Does it exist?

“If the world is made of mathematical relationships, mathematical relationships among WHAT? Maybe they’re not among anything. Maybe the relationships are all that exist. Maybe the world is MADE of math. What exactly is the other option? That the world is made of “things”? What the hell is a “thing”? It was one of those concepts that fold under the slightest interrogation. Look closely at any object and you find it’s an amalgamation of particles. But look closely at the particles and you find that they are irreducible representations of the Poincare symmetry group - whatever that meant. The point is, particles, at bottom, look a lot like math.” In other words - the universe is not described by information - the universe is actually constructed of information. “It from bit” as the saying goes.

It’s a mindblowing thing to think about. It makes me want to pull a Samuel Johnson in response to Bishop Berkeley’s 18thc philosophy of immaterialism (which, by the way, is not entirely different from the prevailing theories of modern theoretical physics!) and go find a rock and kick it and shout “I refute it THUS.” How can this stone not be real? How can it exist only as a mathematical equation, as information in relation to other (so-called) “things”?

It makes your head explode. It’s delicious. We’re all quantumly entangled with each other and with everything else. The acidheads are totally right about everything.

[sergevernaillen · Rating 1 out of 5]

Weer eens op het verkeerde been gezet door de tekst op de achterflap en verschillende recensies. Toen ik aan het boek begon was ik dus in de veronderstelling dat hier via een goed opgebouwd verhaal over een dochter, Amanda zelf, en haar vader (trouwens echte personen), een inzicht zou gegeven worden over belangrijke ontdekkingen en inzichten in de natuurkunde.

Dat laatste klopt nog wel…. Tenminste: dat veronderstel ik toch want het is niet dat een beetje basiskennis over de natuurkunde voldoende is om dit helemaal te kunnen volgen. Met mijn wetenschappelijke achtergrond dacht ik wel dit allemaal aan te kunnen maar de uitleg en theorieën die hier uit de doeken worden gedaan zijn echt niet te volgen als je geen diepere kennis hebt over kwantummechanica, relativiteitstheorieën, singulariteiten, zwarte gaten, krommingen van ruimte en tijd, enz. En die heb ik dus niet waardoor dit moeilijk te volgen was.

Maar meer nog: dat goed opgebouwd verhaal is ook ver te zoeken. Het begint wel veelbelovend over hoe de vader worstelt met de vraag “hoe omschrijf je niets?”, hoe vader en dochter daar over discussiëren, hoe Amanda meer en meer geïnteresseerd geraakt, hoe ze op zoek gaat naar info en zo in contact komt met de grootste en belangrijkste onderzoekers op dat vlak. Maar na een honderdtal bladzijden is al duidelijk dat het beschrijven van de zoektocht naar het antwoord voor Gefter minder en minder belangrijk wordt en ze eigenlijk alleen als zeer kleine kapstok dienen om haar uitleg over de natuurkundige principes te kunnen geven. En dat maakt het allemaal nog wat minder boeiend.

Ik zal eerlijk zijn: na iets meer dan 160 pagina’s ben ik begonnen met snel doorbladeren naar passages die me iets meer konden boeien en heb ik alleen nog die gelezen. Na pagina 326 heb ik het definitief opgegeven (het boek is meer dan 500 pagina’s dik).

En de volgende dag wordt aangekondigd dat de beroemde natuurkundige Stephen Hawking, die meermaals in dit boek aan bod komt, is overleden. Toeval? Of toch een onvoorziene kromming van ruimte en tijd?

[Kay Chandler · Rating 4 out of 5]

I both really enjoyed reading this book and found it difficult to read in parts. The ideas are so interesting to explore and the author does a very good job of explaining how she approaches the ideas and connects them to other ideas through the search she and her father undertake to understand what is real. It is a difficult concept for me to wrap my head around and some of the in depth physics discussions lost me. But I enjoyed trying to understand and it was one of those books that I often thought about even when I wasn’t reading it. The things that most stick with me are having curiosity, wondering about the world and how we see it, and meaningfulness of relationships to share our experiences as a way of making sense of life.

[Artem Huletski · Rating 4 out of 5]

Поиск ответа может быть увлекательным, даже если этого ответа нет; к концу я немного запутался в теоретической части, хотелось бы посмотреть опыты вживую, чтобы начать думать об этом самостоятельно.

[Mary T · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book!

[Gabe · Rating 5 out of 5]

A memoir about nothing and physics at the same time

I liked this book because it earnestly tried to explain advanced physics and the state of the art while posing as a memoir / quest of discovery. Masterfully done.

[B. Rule · Rating 4 out of 5]

The framing of this book is fantastic. Fittingly, Gefter writes not from the objective, god's eye perspective of most physics books, but instead has written this as a memoir of personal intellectual exploration. She chronicles her lifelong quest for knowledge of ultimate reality, starting with a conversation with her father about nothingness in a Chinese restaurant at age 15. The story of their relationship as partners in crime to discover the riddle of existence is beautiful, inspiring, and wonderfully heartwarming. Her dad sounds amazing.

Gefter does a pretty good job of walking the reader through some of the most complex concepts of modern physics, and her irreverent, slightly punky tone is a refreshing approach. That said, she is a bit of a wild-eyed guide, and at times, I lost the thread as her excitement overwhelms her clarity. Nonetheless, that passion is a lot of fun to read. I found myself ultimately more sympathetic to the Zen and intellectual hunger of her father, and she pays him tribute more than any parent could ever hope for.

The ultimate conclusions of their quest are essentially the radical observer-dependence of reality (i.e., the failure of any invariant or absolute objective perspective to accurately and completely describe the universe), and that all this "something" is really still nothing (what they cutely call the H-state: an infinitely homogeneous state) considered from within a bounded, observer frame of reference. Her end position, that of one universe for every observer, each a solipsistic whole unto itself with no possibility of a unifying outside perspective encompassing and stitching them all together, is both fascinating and horrifying from a metaphysical perspective.

My problem with these answers is that Gefter doesn't do much beyond that to question "why is reality so seemingly observer-dependent? Why does the qualia of existence seem so much like there is something to the universe?" One of the reasons I ended up wishing to spend more time with her father is that he seemed to ponder those questions a little more slowly and reflectively, while Amanda's perspective is a manic, mad dash for The Answer. Warren seemed like he was approaching the question of existence from a point of existential need, while Amanda is more goal-oriented.
Overall though, a very unusual and interesting science book and one that gives a much different flavor than the usual proceedings. If nothing else, the inspiration of their father-daughter relationship will stay with me a long time.

[Michael Taouk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Let's face it, physicists, in general, tend to be aloof. You and I rarely understand the inner workings of the sanctuary. The high priests see no reason to bother with the ignorant masses. With a rare and powerful mixture of modesty, confidence and charm, Amanda Gefter bridges the divide. The beauty and wonder of the sanctuary together with its dark secrets are left bare for all to see. “Trespassing on Einstein’s Lawn” is investigative journalism at its best.
Gefter, narrating a story in the first person, begins with cashew chicken and a basic question posed by her father: “What is nothing?” She defines “reality” as that which does not change depending on the frame of reference from which it is observed. - “If you can find one frame of reference in which the thing disappears, then it’s not invariant, its observer-dependent”. She then sets out exploring theoretical physics in search of one measurable thing that is “real”. She takes us with her on an adventure encompassing everything, from the smallest dimensions of quantum mechanics to the nature of the universe as a whole.
Gefter reveals two fundamental limitations in science. The first is the folly of our attempt to view the universe from the outside, when there is no outside. The second is the mind's inability to comprehend itself - similar to Godel's incompleteness theorem. Avoiding these two errors eliminates a myriad of paradoxes that plague Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity. In their zeal for an objective reality, the greatest minds, including Einstein and Bohr repeatedly fall into the trap.
Thank you, Amanda. My beautiful, objective, secure and cozy scientific world is shattered, revealing an even greater beauty! I will be reading this book again and again.

[Mysteryfan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Five reasons to read Trespassing on Einstein's Lawn by Amanda Gefter

1. It's a great example of parents encouraging a child's interest in science. Especially because girls are so often discouraged from expressing an interest in science
2. It's a wonderful story of a father/daughter relationship.
3. It's all about the cutting edge of physics and the scientists involved in it, explained in clear, plain language.
4. Physics as philosophy - the subtitle is "the meaning of nothing and the beginning of everything."
5. Figuring out how we know when we are adults is something we've all thought about.
In other words I really liked it and recommend it highly.

[Margaret · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this book to be wonderfully written and incredibly accessible in terms of the physics. It is often hard for people who are not typically science inclined to follow discussions of physics, and worse, if we are interested, it is hard to figure out where to start in learning the theories. This book sidestepped that issue by using her personal narrative to progress the reader's understanding of physics in the same manner that she learned it. Plus, the story she tells is incredibly interesting and well written. I would absolutely pick up another book written by her. Recommended for people interested in physics, but who have been intimidated by trying to learn it.

[Carl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amanda Gefter is amazingly clever, there’s no doubt about that. So it’s hard to take completely seriously her “aw-shucks-I’m-just-a-humanities girl/science was never my bag” routine that she uses to weave her narrative around.

But it’s a thrilling narrative and it gets to the heart of some of the biggest questions of existence so I’ll forgive a little false modesty. Especially since she comes across as so goddamn impressively plucky and writes in an engaging and disarming (given the complexity of the topic) manner.

If you’re interested in physics: highly recommended. But be very suspicious of anyone who claims to have really understood it.

[Stewart Tame · Rating 4 out of 5]

Make no mistake: this book is tough chewing in places. Amanda Gefter has a real knack for explaining physics without oversimplifying. That said, I could still smell smoke coming out of my ears from trying to get a handle on some of these concepts. The book is an engaging read. Part memoir and part scientific textbook, this book tells the story of Amanda and her father's initial interest in physics and the lengths they ultimately go to to pursue their interest. This is a marvelous book, and an excellent survey of the current state of physics.

[Joel · Rating 5 out of 5]

A conceptual tour of physics, a philosophical look at "nothing and everything" and the best explanation I'ver read on the insane wonder and batshit crazy implications of all that is modern physics. This is the first book I have underlined since college. Many of the most "you have got to be kidding me" theories of String and Quantum physics that I could never wrap my head around were explained in ways that got through. Read. Think. Discuss...

[Randy L. Smith · Rating 2 out of 5]

I get lost in the physics concepts and theories, but love the challenge. A pleasant story, layman physics descriptions, and a lot of food for thought.
Conversely I can't ignore two thoughts. 1) This book is about a daughters obsession with her father. 2) Her physics is a mental masturbation without an orgasm.

[Vance J. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’ve wanted to read this since listening to a Physics World podcast several years ago. It’s a compelling story and the author certainly has guts discussing modern cosmology with the living giants of the field. I had hopes of recommending this book to my students (I am a HS physics teacher), but I was put off by the random vulgarity...which adds nothing to the book.

[C · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent and engrossing description of the latest developments in cosmology. The final chapter is more than a bit speculative, but few other books about this subject come close to being this readable and entertaining.

[Anthony J. Cusano · Rating 5 out of 5]

fiction is truer than truth

Amanda Getzer courageously shares a beautiful, irreverently irreverent adventure story of her quest to discover the true meaning of nothingness. Let’s face it, that’s probably not an adventure story that the majority of those unannointed by the Academy will want to share. Though a dense and sometimes dizzying presentation of ideas and characters in the evolution of the most powerful tools of human intelligence - math, science, philosophy, poetry, literature, and religion - the shlog for those with the patience, and perhaps with the privilege of having had the kinds of experiences that only the Academy can provide, is well worth the effort to follow along.

A memoir is not published as fiction, but by its definition as a story told from inside the mind of a single observer, it cannot be non-fiction. By weaving her tale within the boundaries of the vast and complex human social mind, Amanda Getzer reveals that there is no such thing as non-fiction, only shadows of truth openly shared, or truth inadvertently hidden by the shadows of self.

This book does not popularize science, nor does it advance it. It does ask science some very hard questions, and accurately records it’s answers. It has a thrilling denouement, but it’s missing a satisfying ending. Hopefully now that Amanda has discovered her purpose and her voice she will apply her keen wit and relentless intellect to finishing the quest for the full meaning of nothingness; a meaning that can fill more people’s lives with purpose, or at least with the capacity to purposefully set out into the real world they inhabit.

In short, I loved it. But to borrow some words from Amanda Getzer, I may be bat-shit crazy.