In keeping with the Halloween season, here are ten spooky scientific concepts and discoveries
that may have implications that not only do we not currently fully understand, some of
them may never be understandable at all.
10.
The Anthropic Principal
Human life exists.
That's something we cannot refute, because, well, we're certainly here.
That means that our universe is fine tuned just so that it allows for human life and,
perhaps most importantly, consciousness to exist.
We're not sure why this is, and attempts by science to determine some underlying process
that governs why the universe is the way it is have been fruitless.
It's not perfect for life for any particular reason, it just is.
This is known as the fine-tuning problem.
There are a number of different values in the universe that are very narrow, they must
be tightly defined for the universe to work at all.
The trouble is, there doesn't appear to be a reason for why these values are set the
way they are.
For example, if the strong nuclear force were just a bit stronger or just a bit weaker,
then none of this could exist as it does.
What set that value?
We don't know.
And there are quite a few other values that seem to be set just right.
So what does this mean?
It probably means one of two things.
On the one hand, it could indicate that there are many universes making up a multiverse
where we just happen to be in the one where things are just right, but most of the others
are probably lifeless and radically different.
This seems to fit with advanced physics, such as string theory, and there may indeed be
potential indicators of other universes, more on that in a minute.
But on the other hand if this is the only universe then we live in statistically almost
impossible conditions.
You have a better chance of winning the lottery ten times in a row over ten consecutive weeks
than for this universe to just happen to be the way it is for no reason.
This would support something called simulation theory, which posits that we're all some sort
of A.I. living within a computer simulation.
This theory has its merits, see my video "Is the Universe Real?
Or is it a Computer Simulation".
But if it is a Simulation, then who created it?
9.
Mass Extinction
We all know about the potential possibility that an asteroid could strike the earth and
we could go extinct as a result.
Increased attention on this threat has led to efforts to track near earth asteroids and,
if we're smart, we'll develop ways to move asteroids and ensure that this scenario never
happens.
And while Earth's history has seen a number of mass extinctions, the most famous of which
killed the dinosaurs, what a lot of people don't realize is that we're actually in the
middle of a mass extinction right now.
Called the Holocene Extinction, this ongoing event affects almost every family of plants
and animals and is the greatest loss of biodiversity since the cretaceous-Paleogene extinction
event that killed the dinosaurs along with three quarters of the species living on Earth
at the time.
That event is thought to have been due to an asteroid that had the effect of several
million nuclear warheads detonating at once.
This new extinction event is nothing close to an asteroid.
But it's unique among the extinctions because we're causing it.
And we have been for thousands of years.
We are linked with the extinction of the earth's megafauna, such as the mammoths, at the end
of the last ice age and to this day we continue to impact the environment in such a way as
to continue the extinctions.
In short, as far as threats to life in general are concerned, we are deadly.
But there is a silver lining here.
Science and intelligence.
And, using genetics, science does allow us to eventually bring those species back from
the dead and restore, plan and manage earth's biodiversity.
Ethical questions aside, the mammoth someday may walk the earth once more.
8.
You are not alone.
One of the most interesting theories within science is that there could be alternate parallel
universes in addition to our own.
One variant of this theory allows for universes to occupy the same space, hovering just inches
away but existing in a kind of higher vibration that makes them invisible.
While highly speculative, it's possible that just inches away from you could be another
universe.
Perhaps another earth exists in that universe occupying the same space.
There could be people or other creatures that you can't see in the same room with you at
all times and you'd never know it.
7.
Gravity is not of this universe
One of the most elusive mysteries in science is the nature of gravity.
Einstein himself spent much of his later career trying to understand it to no avail.
And now, years later, we still do not have a successful quantum theory of gravity.
That's led to much speculation within science that steps outside of the boundaries of quantum
physics and into some place else.
One potential theory of gravity suggests that the reason gravity is so difficult to understand
is because it's not native to our universe at all, and is simply leaking into it from
a parallel universe that we know nothing about.
6.
The Great Void
There is a strange 330 million light-year region of space that is almost completely
devoid of galaxies.
Voids in space are not unheard of, galaxies attract each other through gravitation and
areas empty out.
But none of them are anywhere near as big as the great void.
In fact, it's so large that there hasn't been enough time since the Big Bang for such a
huge void to form.
So what caused it?
One theory is that it formed as a group of smaller voids coalesced.
That's probably the case, but there is another theory that takes us into strange territory
indeed.
It is possible, though beyond highly unlikely, that the void could be due to a Kardashev
type III civilization expanding outward building Dyson Spheres.
As they build them, the stars inside would appear to blink out.
This could explain the void's remarkably spherical shape, however such a civilization would be
easily detected by searching the void for infra-red radiation consistent with Dyson's
spheres.
So far, this has not been detected, nor has the question of the viability of completely
encasing a star in a Dyson shell been settled.
5.
The End of the Universe
Can the universe simply blink out of existence one day?
Frighteningly, it may be possible.
There are two ways for the universe to just go away.
The first is the false vacuum theory.
This somewhat complicated theory is based on a question we don't know the answer to.
If the universe exists in its lowest energy state, then it won't happen.
If it doesn't, then the universe could suddenly tunnel into a lower energy state and the false
vacuum state collapses.
This would potentially alter our universe instantaneously to a state where matter can
no longer exist.
Everything would simply cease to exist in less than the blink of an eye.
The second involves Simulation theory.
If this is all a computer simulation, whoever is running it can presumably shut it down
any time they wish.
4.
The Great Cold Spot
The Great Void may not be alone in the universe.
In the constellation Eridanus lies a strange, very cold region of space where the cosmic
background radiation is very weak.
We don't know why this is, most generally accepted theoretical models don't allow for
it.
Yet there it is.
One unlikely possibility is that it formed during the Big Bang, but there are problems
with that.
Another possibility is that a huge void is causing it, similar to the Great Void mentioned
earlier, but there are problems with this theory as well.
But one theory takes things a step further.
It has been suggested that the cold spot could be an imprint from a parallel universe beyond
our own.
This is actually an attractive possibility because it would support string theory, and
it may be testable to determine if this is evidence of parallel universes.
The theory goes that there should be a similar cold spot at the opposite end of the universe.
This has not been observed, but complex computer modeling shows that it should be there.
3.
The slate-wiping extraterrestrial virus
If there is other life in the universe it's safe to assume that the vast majority of it
will be microbial in nature.
Because of this, since the early days of space exploration NASA has gone to great lengths
to ensure that our astronauts returning from the moon and any samples from space have been
quarantined just in case there was life hiding within them.
There is an excellent reason for this.
Such things, like their earthly counterparts, could make us sick or even extinct.
There is really no way to know what might happen if alien viruses escaped containment.
They might not do well in our environment and be killed off by earth life war-of-the-worlds
style, or be incompatible with all forms of life on earth, or they may be favored by our
environment and life on earth becomes easy pickings with no hope of developing immunity.
Unfortunately for us, there is one area of this question where we have no defenses.
Meteorites.
In theory, meteorites can ferry living organisms from planet to planet.
And, unlike asteroids, we really can't predict when or where they are going to fall.
Tons of them fall every month, most of them plunging into the ocean, any one of them carrying
potential contamination.
2.
Dark Matter and Dark Energy
Dark matter is invisible.
It does not interact with light and cannot be directly seen, despite being a large portion
of the existing matter and energy in the universe, about 26.8 percent.
How we see it is through its gravity acting on the universe, which has profound effects
on the structure of galaxies and the formation of the universe.
While we have some ideas on what dark matter might be, such as weakly interacting subatomic
particles, ultimately they are just that, ideas and other than gravity we know almost
nothing about this stuff and what implications it might have on the universe long-term.
Even stranger is dark energy.
It seems to permeate space itself and drives and accelerates the expansion of the universe.
And there's a lot of it, making up nearly 70 percent of the energy in the universe.
Whether this energy can be used, or what implications it has on the universe's future remain largely
unknown.
1.
Dark Flow
This phenomenon may well be the weirdest in the universe, if it exists at all -- that
is somewhat disputed.
At first glance, it just appears to be a certain movement seen in galaxy clusters.
They seem to move in a common direction.
Standard models say that this should not be so, the motion should be random in all directions.
But it's not.
There are several possible explanations.
The motion may be an effect of something that happened before the 380,000 year brick wall
where before that we can't see what happened during the big bang.
But it could also be something very different.
Scientists at NASA's Goddard Space Center proposed that the flow could be due to another
universe tugging on the galaxies, or perhaps an area of space time that is significantly
different than what we're used to that runs on a completely different set of rules.
We simply do not know what is out there.
Thanks for listening.
I am futurist and science fiction author John Michael Godier, currently nibbling on the
Halloween candy I'm supposed to be giving out to kids later tonight, and be sure to
check out my books at your favorite online retailer and subscribe to my channel for regular,
in-depth explorations into the interesting, weird and unknown aspects of this amazing
universe in which we live.