Lee Smolin - What Do Black Holes and Dark Matter Reveal? 

OK, this is Robert Kuhn at his best. He not only doesn't get in the way of the guest, but he helps the guest unfold his ideas by, as we say in the news business, "sign posting" the interview; putting pauses in the interview, summing up, and pointing in a direction for further discussion. Perfecto!

One of the best CTT videos I have watched. New intriguing ideas here I never heard before

Lee “Smokin” Smolin. Absolute genius.

It might take us a dozen of thousand years to find out eventually.... but this is actually one of the most compelling and consistent ideas about the universe(s): That we're actually sitting inside a gigantic black hole spawned by some parent universe.

Lee Smolin always has very interesting ideas. We need more revolutionary thinkers who understand the math but who are also creative in their attempts to explain the physical universe. The physical universe is not mathematics. Math is in approximation of what the universe is and even if we had the ultimate equations I think that would be true.

It's always a great pleasure to listen to brilliant Dr Smolin.

Fantastic interview. It's unfortunate that Lee sort of dodged or just didn't understand what the interviewer was talking about when asked essentially, "if forever is part of the process, then why are we here when universes should be just creating black holes". The answer, seemingly, is that we're at the apex of blackhole creation and more or less there's no way in the entire range of possible laws of physics for universes to do more. We're at the end of the line because an infinite chain of universes would be entirely that best selected range... is what I would have expected Lee to say. Still, there's concern here mixing an infinity and an evolutionary effect. Lee is suggesting there was a time when universes weren't well selected... but that would imply a true start of some sort even if we're now on the path of an infinite evolutionary process of universes, and that opens up new questions.

I sure wish these videos give dates when the discussions occurred.

Lee Smolin is always good to listen to, thanks.

Great job Robert! Ive listened to a lot of Smolin but you have an amazing gift of boiling it down for me to understand. Keep up the great work!

I love the fecund universe theory, it has a poetry about it that many of the best theories have (which isn't to say it's necessarily true, but it's a point in its favour). Very humble of Lee to say right away that it isn't his original idea. I always assumed it was, but it's interesting to know that he sees himself as just the messenger.

Enough to make one feel proud to be living in a special universe producing all these black holes, I'm holding my head high today.

How lucky are we to have these ongoing, very interesting and enlightening conversations? Even if I don't quite understand them.

Sería estupendo que estuvieran disponibles los subtítulos en Español para poder disfrutar plenamente de estos estupendos vídeos

I’ve always just kinda daydreamed and came up with crazy ideas like the possibility that when a black hole forms on our side on the other side a “Big Bang” has happened. Then in that universe the same thing happens. And then in that one. And it just keeps going for eternity.

My question is if a black hole makes a new universe does this universe only have all the mass the black hole has. If this is the case for an entire universe that is extremely little mass.

They should stop calling it dark matter and call it clear matter because you can see all the stars and galaxies with no obstruction .

Wonderful talk. Fascinating. I really enjoyed this thank you.

Thank you, Lee, that was wonderful. Biology derived principles explaining cosmology? Sure. Of course, we identify scientific principles and tendencies from what we see all around us and right in from of us. Many of these reach far beyond Earth science and are interwoven throughout the universe. It is all math at its core. Fascinating.

Such a wonderful conversation.

Off topic: I do notice double voice channels being played at the same time when you speak, not your guest speaking. It makes that weird "electronic" voice. Is it due to proximity of the second mic or is it just one microphone played from two channels at the same time, while one being delayed due to something?

What I don't understand is that a single black hole doesn't suck in enough matter to create a universe as big as ours, right?

Best content on the tube 👏

Wow, what an explanation. Amazed

"Black Holes are probably the most remarkable thing in this Universe." High praise indeed, for something that we barely understand, and have no idea what they are made of. It is telling that one of the most destructive forces in nature, should be considered more "remarkable", than the most creative force in nature, Life. Of course, it would be fascinating if Black Holes were the seeds of new universes, but they would be rather small universes, unless they 'magically' create more matter than they consume. One would have thought that Life in general, the human brain in particular, and its associated consciousness, would be considered the most remarkable thing in the known Universe. The human brain is certainly the most complex structure in the known Universe. It is remarkable indeed, that a highly educated human brain should consider a Black Hole to be more remarkable than Itself. Is a Black Hole, with only three properties: mass, spin, and electric charge, 'really' more remarkable than a human brain...!!? I very much doubt it...

I read "Life if the Cosmos" when I was just a kid and its theory of black hole/universe evolution still seems the most intuitive and correct to me.

Always are. Always were. Always will.

Sounds like existence is multiplying new bubbles of reality at an exponential rate similar to the proliferation of bubbles you see when you run your evening bubble bath...

mind blowing explanation.

Under this model, what happens when black holes collide (which they surely do)? Do larger black holes (like TON618) have other advantages vis-a-vis this anthropic framework than smaller ones? In other words its not just the number of children you have, it could also be how smart/big/strong they are?

Amazing insights. I agree that we are so lucky to have access to conversations that only a peers would get and yet after much listening and reading , we can appreciate the ideas behind the mathematics that boggles the mind. Thank you.

I feel for smolin...the guy's completely authentic and the single only of his generation to have earned the desk he sits at. He re-invented the whole concept of popular science books...his books represent his own original journeys, and he respects the layperson as equal human being. He does not patronise, or water down. Only Feynman before him, ever showed such deep respect. Right now he has to stand and bear witness to the tragic and catastrophic collapse at the knowledge frontier. He's published papers recently that stand him well across time longer than he will survive. He looks to the future generations now, and hopes that they will basically show up.

Could you please explain a thought that's going round my head but if nothing is faster than the speed of light then why can't light escape a black hole? Surely gravity must by definition be faster than light inorder to stop light escaping??

Could quantum gravity be where two quantum waves / fields exert an attractive gravity force on each other? If energy(s) accelerate towards singularity inside black hole, these accelerating energy(s) produce an attractive gravity force between each other?

It's fascinating that one who studies the subject can look at the progression of matter through ever larger and denser stars and the explosion of those stars and not see the black hole as the end game for recycling matter back into pure potential. Also, think of the time dilation taking place where T=0 at the event horizon. The orbital velocities of those stars close to the center of a galaxy are more than likely illustrative of the rotation of the galaxy as a whole system and not orbital velocities of stars... so that would likely do away with the required dark matter halo we invented to true our math up with observations ala planet Vulcan

This is so mind expanding! One of the boys interesting guests this show ever had.

Fascinating.

So per the question at 545 QM creates a limit to the density of a singularity and the universe which arises from it will have a slightly different set of rules from ours.

As we all know a great channel! But again, please add information on when this was first published. Seems now here been adding a lot of "old" stuff? Nothing wrong, but can be a bit confusing.

8:04 If you search for most massive neutron stars, we've found PSR J0952-0607 which is 2.35 times as much as the sun. I don't know how that affects Smolin's hypothesis, but he specifically mentions "no neutron stars more than 1.6x the mass of the sun" as a testable proof. As such I thought I'd mention that real observation does not seem to match his prediction in at least that regard.

Thank you Robert for the translation 🙏 I'm always suspicious of experts who can't express clearly what they're supposed to master like no one else.

From three dimension classic universe, could there be two dimension quantum information inside the event horizon, then one dimension energy closer to center of black hole, to zero dimension time at singularity?

this is a good question that a theory of everything must be able to address...

Do photons interact with graviton particles in some way, maybe like electrons exchange photons?

It may not be right, but it gets us closer, hopefully. Fascinating discussion of ideas and concepts backed by math and quantum physics. One note, even if there aren't any neutron stars larger than your prediction, you could still be wrong.

From the thumbnail i thought it contained the "aliens? Yes!" Guy.

fix echo in post plzzz

Einstein was right. Imagination plays a big part in understanding reality. That's the easy part. I've had these intuitions about black holes before hearing anyone talk about it, but I'm not a physicist. I think reality can be very intuitive, but then the physicists need to come along and generate the equations to prove the theory.

When was this filmed, Lee has spoken about this idea before.

I’ve always thought the notion of a singularity was wrong because of infinities etc, which in a discrete (meaning quantized) universe seem counterintuitive and thus I suspected that quantum effects would not permit a stable singularity, so I am relieved to hear that the idea was not outlandish and that quantum effects gives the singularity a loophole to escape as a new region of spacetime.

In twins brother having age 10 years. One brother is running with speed of light/photons in stadium over a year and another is watching his brother running up to one year. After one year past what change exists in between them ? If same activity do in space too what change exist in between two brothers? Both have gps watch in their hands. What change exist in 1 year? Do they feel different change ? For both day nights, season... exist differently? In one years one be 50 years old? Another be 11 ? Space time doesn't exist. Time exist. Time has no beginning and end.

Maybe the so called planet nine is actually dark matter or a primordial black hole, which are the black holes that are the size of a atom but the mass of a planet I believe. Or something like that.

NTS g/100/use It’s cert similar to what Bohm says about the small changes which may lead com a different quality of elements, laws and universes.

My question would be what happens in the case of supermassive black holes and black hole merging.

Well that was a lot of fun!

How does one test the “offspring theory” when they can’t even test the theories that explain the inside a black hole or what resides beyond the boundary of the universe? I was on board with the explanation of white holes, but passing genetic information from one universe to another universe seems like a stretch, especially considering the random nature of particle physics. And if this guy thinks the repeating universe cannot go on for infinity, then he would have to demonstrate where the deficit resides to eat away at the conserved energy. What would make the cycle stop?

Great guest and interview. If SPIRAL, there is NO ongoing hyper-density at galactic centers and no need to predict/require the missing Dark Matter (and Dark Energy) _ reference SPIRAL's 'Black Hole illusion Resolution' hypothesis and SPIRAL's 'GRIP' hypothesis on galactic rotation. PAST, not ongoing, hyper-density accounts for the empirical observations. reference in Pearlman YeC for the alignment of Torah testimony, science and ancient civ. volume II

what's the largest neutron star that has ever been observed? ChatGPT: The largest neutron star observed so far is called PSR J0740+6620. It has a mass of about 2.08 times that of our sun, packed into a sphere with a diameter of only about 20 kilometers. This neutron star is remarkable not only for its mass but also because it tests the limits of how massive neutron stars can be before collapsing into black holes. This observation is crucial for understanding the properties of matter under extreme conditions. Lee Smolin talks about how if there were a Neutron star of this size, the theory he talks about here is likely not correct

I don't quite understand the concept of spawning separate universes from black holes within our universe as there is a huge difference between the amount of matter that has been "swallowed" by a black hole and the amount of matter we see all around us in the universe. How can a singular black hole created in our universe create another universe similar to ours with only a minute fraction of the matter? If the universe created has matter equal to the matter swallowed by the black hole then very quickly the "children" become infinitesimally small. If there is no link to the amount of matter created vs the amount swallowed by the black hole in it's creation then... how does that work?

Deep stuff.

Where does the energy come from to create these new universes?

a singularity , a point with a universe either side like 2 ballons one inflates one collapes then repeat , i can get with that .

I came up with the theory that the universe is a black hole then all of a sudden I hear it is an old concept. Strange I only hear about it after the fact. I have herd of pre big bang time and found that to be interesting. I am just trying to grasp what are we apart of and why. How can nothing give rise to something? The God concept seems to be the most comforting to me. Is everything fractal and just states of energy and where did the energy originate? I can't help but to ponder how trivial we live our lives and fight over who has what. Like primitive minds bent on self destruction. No love or spiritual growth. Just this vibe thing everyone is hooked on. What do we really know about the greatness of this Universe?

If there are untold billions of them, we need a better word than "universe."

This is my idea of what dark energy is: I suspect that there are countless big bangs in the universe or multiverse, as many big bangs, or white holes, as there are black holes; they are the opposite ends of wormholes. You just connect the dots (the "singularities"), and you have no singularities, just a transition, a cause and an effect, as you find everywhere in the macrocosmic world. I subscribe to Lee Smolin's idea, that every time a collapsing black hole creates a new universe within its event horizon, the initial conditions of that Big Bang cause that universe to either successfully evolve, or fail and become chaotic. It's the natural selection of worlds. I also came up with the idea that if the event horizon of the black hole, which has all the information about the energy which entered it (a la Hawking), actually holographically projects the new offspring universe within, which Professor Leonard Susskind has suggested, that this could explain what Dark Energy is. When the black hole in the parent universe is absorbing new energy, this causes the event horizon to expand, so that the universe inside the black hole expands with the new energy feeding it. In this scenario, the "parent" universe is constantly "feeding" the baby universe and causing it to grow. Of course when the parent universe's black hole (like an umbilical wormhole) stops feeding the new universe, and Hawking radiation starts depleting its energy, this would cause the offspring universe to contract and shrink in size, until it might eventually collapse back into the parent universe. I also like the metaphor of the parent and child; it has "elegance" and symmetry. It is usually binary star systems which cause the creation of black holes. One star feeds upon the other, gets "pregnant" as it were, when it collapses into a black hole and gives birth to a new baby universe, and then keeps feeding the baby universe with new energy it gathers from its surroundings. What happens inside super-massive black holes or merging black holes is a different matter. Also, if the geometry of string theory holds true, the collapse of the black hole might reach the transitional point of a 6-dimensional Calibi-Yau manifold, and that's how the collapsing energy squeezes out into a new dimension as a white hole. Maybe even new universes require a good Mom, with a healthy umbilical cord, to be successful.

I've heard Lee talk about this before,,but this time it seemed more understandable,,I think I'm in. 🤔 At least until we find that bigger than normal Neutron star 🌟 .

Very honest, enjoyable conversation. But black holes play a ROLE in the behavior of the galaxy. All this speculation about their relation with new univs is just mumbo-jumbo. And worse, it does not even touch the essential: What is their ROLE. Humans have a striking tendency to run away from hard problems by increasing complexity. We jump to a higher level of complexity in which the original problem is disguised and we fancy that we have solved it. While, in reality, we have only hidden the problem under a pile of conceptual constructs that we understand less than the original. (Examples: Superdeterminism to solve-hide the paradoxes of QM. Multiverse, in the same context. Changing laws of physics, to understand-hide the many problems we don't understand. So on so forth.. Conversely, take the history of good theories. They require usually an initial effort to change some deep inbred assumption of us, but immediately it gives a simpler framework than the original. So simple, that we soon forget that there was a serious problem before. Eg, the circulation of blood - imagine the crazy complex things that were speculated before Harvey told them the simpler truth: It was the same blood that was circulating around, and the heart was pumping it. (Feynman: "Truth always turns out to be simpler than we thought").

Inside the event horizon of black hole, maybe quantum gravity is between quantum information (two dimensions)?

Who selected the laws? Why did the selection process end the way it did?

Woah

A natural selection of many universes until one in the numbers shows up with the right ingredients for life therefore intelligent even perhaps conscious life to exist, I like it..

So not only are there ancient Egyptians, there could be ancient civilisations in the parent, grand parent etc universe. Should there not be information flow between universes? Can we get some photos ever?

What about Hawkin radiation?

0:56-0:58 time stops, is removed (supposedly singularity) and time continues… ???

So he gave us a version of a multiverse

Dude!

I believe Richard Dawkins speculates on this topic of universes, black holes, & natural selection at the end of the edition of Selfish Gene I have. I wonder if he was referencing Lee Smolin's work or if they both came up with the idea independently?

Would it take a very long time for a black hole to bring about a new universe, like when the black hole evaporates after billions or trillions of years?

I've been thinking for a long time that black holes create new universes. I love this stuff.

Much like what we can see/observe now, gravity wins, gravity always wins given enough time in space. The same aspects will reveal itself to be the same approach/process with quantum gravity's effects at those scales.

What do they prove ? That we don't know the true nature of the universe !

Rather CTT than TCC.

What if all the antimatter from the beginning of universe got clumped into black holes.

Question I would have wanted to know is how does the universe expand forever when black holes are supposed to evaporate if of course we're living in a black hole.

Imagine if we aim a billion ( or some outrageous huge) number of dark matter particles at one single point all to arrive at one specific time with let's say 10% speed of light. As the collapsing sphere of dark matter particles come closer their speeds will keep increasing approaching speed of light but not quite reaching it. At some point the escape velocity of that collapsing sphere will exceed the speed of light. Even after that happens the dark matter particles totally unaware will pass through that single point and continue their path a very short distance and then fall back to oscillate very rapidly with a very small distance.... Now same thought experiment with dark matter particles aimed in a small area rather than a point. I think they would all happily spin in very tight circles with speed approaching speed of light.....heavier the black holes faster these guys spin. . So in others words we don't need infinite density to create a black hole of certain mass. Since these dark matter particles have mass they will require greater and greater force to speed up as they approach speed of light which means a buzzing beehive of dark matter particles can exist at any mass but it never reaches an infinite density. Since we cannot see past the event horizon, but may be at some super density even Regular Baryionic matter converts to dark matter and we can have stable black hole that still follows Einstein general relativity laws.... The only assumption I am making is that dark matter is a heavy particle that does not interact via weak force, strong force, electromagnetic. It only interacts via gravity..... Would love to hear how my conjecture violates laws of physics

The black matter is just a regular matter that got there going by the black holes, we know that m>0 makes an attractive gravity and it explains why the black matter is always underneath the galaxies, but how it is in Dirac's dimension it can't reflect the light and how we know the higgs and the m>0 crates a attractive gravity and it explains why the light has the same results on dark matter but we can't see it because it is in other dimension and soon nasa will find the white holes and they will throw m

I have predıcted with my theory and my formula 6.3 tımes greater speed of light which is measured as apparently inside of M87 black hole. I SUGGEST HAVING A LOOK AT THE FIRST PART OF MY THEORY AND MY FIRST FORMULA WHICH DETERMINES A LINEAR VELOCITY OF...6.3 TIMES GREATER THAN THE SPEED OF LIGHT, ETC. AND I TOLD WHERE OUR MEASURED CONSTANTS ARE ROOTED IN. We need to change the concept of matter that makes us imprisoned by all kinds of impressions and especially by accepting the vacuum illusion which it has been sitting comfortably in it

Since god and the law of energy conservation : systemic energy is constant, are effectively equivalent with respect to an existential guarantee, couldn't you argue that without a means for distinguishing between their outcomes, a predictive claim is disqualified from science?

Such humility, to say 'this is the only thing I added'. The welcome antithesis of theological certainty and arrogance.

If you look at the black hole from above it's like a whirlpool spinning with all going down the middle

Smolin's idea is lent a little credence by James Gate's discovery that error correcting codes can be found in the supersymmetric equations associated with string theory. Error correcting 'codes' are found in DNA to prevent too much mutation from happening. Maybe error correcting codes are part of the fabric of the universe to control the mutations during reproduction. You would not need error correcting codes if mutations were not happening at all. Error correcting codes control the rate and manner of mutations - too much and too little mutation is not good. Error correcting codes in DNA are also subject to evolution, meaning that the proper amount of error correction is selected for.

Dark matter the super villain of space exploration

life is the craziest thing in universe

I am no physicist, and correct me if I am wrong but, if our universe is a by product of another universe, each subsequent universe, according to the video would be, much much smaller (less massive) than the previous one, right? furthermore, the universe that produced the blackhole that produced our universe would have to be much more massive/bigger than ours. and the hawking radiation that we observed in our universe? wasn’t that matter being used in the other universe? what is it doing on our side of the blackhole? if this explanation is remotely correct, the “universe” that blackholes create, need to be so fundamentally different than ours, that we might as well call it heaven and hell 🤷‍♂️

Kooky stuff here. In mathematics there’s really no discussion about a singularity in a function, nor would there be any reason to connect them in some way. It’s simply a bit where the function is undefined. It’s not that it’s doing anything. It’s simply not defined as anything. It’s a boundary. It’s bizarre how these guys talking about singularities as if it’s reality. It’s an artifact of a limited mathematical theory. That’s all

Wasn’t there a neutron star discovered in 2019 that has 2 times the mass of the Sun? Puts his theory into the dustbin, doesn’t it?

I find his argument of black holes spawning universes that are only slightly different unconvincing. He defines no mechanism. What he's really arguing is that differences above a certain degree from ours won't generate many or any black holes or too many. But this is only a pruning effect. Any given black hole in our universe can be the source of a failed universe. Prior to falling in, you'll not know what kind of universe is on the other side of the event horizon

It's probably just a chunk of densely-packed neutrons.

Natural selection of universes... the longer a universe stays in balance the higher the likely hood of life developing in a corner....

One day this theory will be proven to be correct.