"Inflation Deflated?"
That title wasn't written here, but news has reached this week's cover of New Scientist that the old theory may be in trouble. In the late 1970's Alan Guth and others suggested that the early universe expanded at warp speed, many times faster than light. Though it solved problems with the Big Bang, inflation would violate both the First Law of Thermodynamics and Relativity's stipulation that nothing moves faster than light. The trouble with inflation was even subject of the editorial:
Why the Best Theories Aren't Always Right
"The theory has inspired a generation of experiments and observations that have hugely increased our understanding of the universe. Questioning and replacing long-held ideas is what science does best."
For decades inflation has served as a useful step. No one has a clue what could make the universe expand faster than light. The multitude of theories rely on mysterious "scalar fields" or "inflaton potentials." None of these fantasies has ever been observed in nature. Though it has been good for theorist's careers, inflation can not be proven. Humans can not time travel to the first 10^{-33} seconds, and no human experiment can approach the titanic energies near the Big Bang.
We can search the Cosmic Microwave Background for signs of inflation. At a conference in Cambridge last December, physicist Benjamin Wandelt showed evidence of non-gaussianity in the CMB. Inflation predicts that the CMB should be the same at all scales and in all directions. Discovery of non-gaussianity would be evidence that inflation is leaking. Wandelt's preliminary results have reached the critical pages of Physical Review Letters v. 100, 181301, Evidence of primordial non-gaussianity (f) in the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe Data at 2.8$\sigma$
New Scientist continues about inflation:
"But it has its flaky side too. Michael Turner of the University of Chicago compares it to a patchwork of duct tape repair. 'It might last for 10 years, but it won't last forever,' he says."
The magazine also quotes Paul Steinhardt, one of the original architects of inflation who has abandoned ship and is working on cyclic universes. Neil Turok, who works with Steinhardt on alternatives to inflation, has recently been named head of Perimeter Institute. More and more big scientists are expressing their doubts. The PLANCK spacecraft to be launched next year will examine the CMB with much greater accuracy, possibly finding evidence that drives nails in the coffin.
New Scientist concludes with an optimistic note:
"Why would this be good news? Because we might then be forced to go back to the drawing board and conjure up a deeper, more satisfying theory. this could be based on existing alternatives to the inflation and cyclic universe ideas--theories that invoke a varying speed of light or modified gravity..."
Did someone say speed of light? We are winning this game! Questioning and replacing long-held ideas is what we do. (Attacking new ideas is what children with computers do.) It is a painfully long process, but eventually the mass of scientists will drift this way.
On the plane from Washington, one of the movies was STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT. Mr. Worf's line to the Borg: "Assimilate this!"
Labels: cosmology, inflation, speed of light
posted by L. Riofrio at 6:28 AM
5 Comments:
Oh, I read this nice article yesterday at a news stand (causing me to miss my bus). I really like the bandaged balloon pictures.
Nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. Suppose instead the antithesis. Nothing can travel slower than the speed of light. What differences would one expect to observe?
Life is Good,
d
In his book 1984, published in 1949, Orwell actually uses astronomy to illustrate doublethink:
'What are the stars?' said O'Brien indifferently. 'They are bits of fire a few kilometres away. We could reach them if we wanted to. Or we could blot them out. The earth is the centre of the universe. The sun and the stars go round it.' Winston made another convulsive movement. This time he did not say anything. O'Brien continued as though answering a spoken objection: 'For certain purposes, of course, that is not true. When we navigate the ocean, or when we predict an eclipse, we often find it convenient to assume that the earth goes round the sun and that the stars are millions upon millions of kilometres away. But what of it? Do you suppose it is beyond us to produce a dual system of astronomy? The stars can be near or distant, according as we need them. Do you suppose our mathematicians are unequal to that? Have you forgotten doublethink?'
The editor of New Scientist is actually well in tune with O'Brien's doublethink.
These CMB data are fascinating and provided just what was needed to make progress also at the theoretical level in quantum TGD.
In TGD framework quantum criticality for hbar increasing phase transition replaces inflation: large scale fluctuations are associated with this phase transition, they need not have anything to do with primordiality.
By looking at some basic facts about fluctuations and their anomalies, I realized that symplectic QFT, an analog of conformal QFT, would be a very natural candidate for describing correlation functions of CMB in TGD framework.
Symplectic invariants (areas of geodesic triangles of sphere of last scattering or at most 4-gons) would be the basic functional building blocks of n-point functions. Fusion rules should fix highly uniquely the fluctuation spectrum.
Some basic predictions are non-Gaussianity and the vanishing of n-point functions for short distances between any argument pair (2-point correlation function indeed vanishes).
Also hemispherical asymmetry and the strange evidence for correlations between galactic geometry and fluctuation spectrum could be understood but only if one accepts that gigantic gravitational Planck constants are reality so that quantum measurements is cosmic scales inducing this kind of correlations are possible. The "right-minded" alternative is of course to say that there is some unidentified galactic foreground involved.
Symplectic QFT in much more general sense would form a natural part of quantum TGD besides conformal QFT:s and fusion of these notions is what would be needed.
For details see my blog postings (this and this).
P.S. A comment to Robert: In TGD framework basic dynamical entities are light-like 3-surfaces (analogous but more general expanding light wave fronts) so that in this sense nothing can travel slower than light! Because this motion is otherwise random, one obtains subliminal velocities and massivation as one looks things with a finite resolution.
Hints of "time before Big Bang":
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/
nature/7440217.stm
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