Quantum Physics, Mini Black Holes, and the Multiverse: Debunking Common Misconceptions in Theoretical Physics

by Yasunori Nomura, Bill Poirier, John Terning

"Modern physics is rife with provocative and fascinating ideas, from quantum mechanics to the multiverse. But as interesting as these concepts are, they are also easy to understand. This book, written with deft hands by true experts in the field, helps to illuminate some of the most important and game-changing ideas in physics today."

                                                                                                 Sean M. Carroll

 



"The Multiversal book series is equally unique, providing book-length extensions of the lectures with enough additional depth for those who truly want to explore these fields, while also providing the kind of clarity that is appropriate for interested lay people to grasp the general principles involved. "  



                                                                                                Lawrence M. Krauss



This book explores, explains and debunks some common misconceptions about quantum

physics, particle physics, space-time, and Multiverse cosmology. It seeks to separate

science from pseudoscience.

The material is presented in layperson-friendly language, followed by additional technical

sections which explain basic equations and principles. This feature is very attractive

to non-expert readers who nevertheless seek a deeper understanding of the theories,

and wish to explore beyond just the basic description.

Multiversal Journeys™ is a trademark of Farzad Nekoogar and Multiversal Journeys, a

501 (c) (3) nonprofit organization.

323 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 23, 2018

Reviews

[Doctor Moss · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was intrigued by the title of this book. It drew my interest because, as a non-scientist, I thought my understanding of some basics, especially in quantum theory, was “off” in ways a book like this could fix. I think I’m one of those readers who probably knows enough to get things interestingly wrong.

That itch was definitely scratched in the first section of the book, on misconceptions in quantum physics. The other two sections appealed less to me, I have to admit. Those dealt respectively with misconceptions about particles and spacetime, and with misconceptions about multiverse theory. But really they also concern different kinds of misconceptions as well.

Each section is written by a different author. The first, by Bill Poirier, who does research in physical chemistry, as I said scratched the itch I came to the book with. I found Poirier to be a very lucid writer about difficult topics.

Poirier adopts an interesting strategy. He upholds the “weirdness” of the quantum world — such things as objective indeterminacy and nonlocality or “spooky action at a distance” (in Einstein’s terms). He sticks to conceptual terms, and I think he succeeds pretty impressively.

I understood much more, for example, about “spooky action at a distance” (a phenomenon by which particles at distant locations may have “entangled” or dynamically coordinated attributes even when the distances between them preclude any sort of causal interactions). Poirier nicely set up the punchline about this with a previous discussion correcting the misconception that the quantum wave function refers to individual particles. You might even make your own inferences about how “spooky action at a distance” might work before you even get to the explicit discussion in the following chapter.

Poirier’s discussion refined my understanding of the topics he discussed — I certainly don’t understand everything I would like to understand, but I’ve moved forward. Without the math, you can certainly miss a lot, and even get a little lost, as in understanding interference patterns in the double slit experiment. As with all three authors, Poirier provides an appendix with more technical (i.e., more mathematically dense) material as well as suggestions for going farther on your own.

I don’t think I profited as much from my reading of the other two sections. The second one, written by John Terning (a particle physicist at UC Davis), concerns misconceptions about particles and spacetime. Poirier, I thought, focused on misconceptions that scientists themselves have made, as well as people like me trying to understand physics and cosmology but falling into mistakes that seemed reasonable. Terning starts out similarly, with a discussion of what “particles” are, correcting the tendency to think of them as “tiny little balls”. But then he progresses on to exaggerated media claims, such as that, “The Higgs Boson could wipe out the Universe.”

I don’t know that I mean to criticize Terning on that point — he is exposing and correcting miconceptions (he even takes on the claim that cell phones can cause brain damage), but they are just of a different sort than the ones I was looking to correct in my own thinking.

One criticism I will make, though, about the construction of the book itself, is that, given that the topics of the three sections overlap (e.g., particles in the second section with quantum physics in the first), it would have been nice to see tighter integration of the writing such that, for instance, the discussion of what particles are in the second section referred specifically back to discussions of the wave function and uncertainty in the first section. It’s not that the sections are inconsistent, only that they don’t build pedagogically upon one another as much as they could.

The third section, misconceptions about multiverse theory, is more a defense of multiverse theory than a correction of misconceptions per se. The author, Yasunori Nomura, is a cosmologist and physicist with great technical and speculative credentials in quantum and cosmological theory. Multiverse theory is often attacked as lacking scientific rigor, particularly lacking critical testable observational predictions.

Nomura defends the theory, citing observational motivations drawn from considerations about the fittingness of the observed universe to complex structure (including intelligent life, e.g, us), and theoretical motivations drawing from string theory and current approaches to resolving purely theoretical conundrums in quantum gravity.

I think Nomura’s comments here are part of a much broader debate, rather than a correction of some basic misconceptions in understanding modern physics. He touches on a number of highly controversial topics, including the relationship between theory and observation, the cosmological anthropic, and the role of mathematical reasoning in scientific theorizing. I think readers would do well to research that broader debate and understand more about why Nomura’s opponents think what they think — this is some good stuff that deserves more than the 30 or so pages we get here.

Overall, I’m certainly glad I read the book, especially the first section, as it addressed the kind of misconceptions I was most concerned about — where I could advance beyond some of my own questions and mistakes.

[Wendelle]

good book that consistently clarifies famous sources of confusion in popularizations of physics, such as the double-slit experiment, the EPR paradox and nonlocality, the Higgs field, the symmetry of time and space dimensions, testability of the multiverse hypothesis, even radiation from cellphones. The choice to lead each chapter with misconceptions and address how they cloud people's impressions is an interestingly proactive pedagogical technique.

[Jovany Agathe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Three Different Views of Misconceptions in Physics and Cosmology

[Donald George · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great research material for science.