- #1
CeeAnne
- 34
- 0
Following is an entry from Q is for Quantum by John Gribbin.
infinity There is more (sometimes less) to infinity for a mathematician than to the person in the street. Science-fiction fans and amateur philosophers may be familiar with the idea that, if the Universe is infinite, then not only must anything that is possible happen somewhere in the Universe, but anything that is possible will happen an infinite number of times, in an infinite number of places. In that case, all the weirdness of the quantum world could be explained as just one huge statistical interference fluke affecting our corner of an infinite Universe. But the catch (apart from the mind-boggling nature of such a statistical fluke) is that this requires a special kind of infinity, called an exhaustively random infinity. It is quite possible to have an infinity that does not include everything - a trivial example is the set of all the even numbers. It is certainly infinite, but it is not exhaustive (or random) because it does not contain any of the odd numbers. Nobody knows whether or not the Universe is infinite, let alone whether or not it is an exhaustively random infinity. -Q is for Quantum-
Are there other plausible infinities and finitudes for the universe? As example, what we've learned about quarks suggest the universe, finite or infinite, is not exhaustively random but a special set. -CeeAnne-
infinity There is more (sometimes less) to infinity for a mathematician than to the person in the street. Science-fiction fans and amateur philosophers may be familiar with the idea that, if the Universe is infinite, then not only must anything that is possible happen somewhere in the Universe, but anything that is possible will happen an infinite number of times, in an infinite number of places. In that case, all the weirdness of the quantum world could be explained as just one huge statistical interference fluke affecting our corner of an infinite Universe. But the catch (apart from the mind-boggling nature of such a statistical fluke) is that this requires a special kind of infinity, called an exhaustively random infinity. It is quite possible to have an infinity that does not include everything - a trivial example is the set of all the even numbers. It is certainly infinite, but it is not exhaustive (or random) because it does not contain any of the odd numbers. Nobody knows whether or not the Universe is infinite, let alone whether or not it is an exhaustively random infinity. -Q is for Quantum-
Are there other plausible infinities and finitudes for the universe? As example, what we've learned about quarks suggest the universe, finite or infinite, is not exhaustively random but a special set. -CeeAnne-