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

Visit the 'dark side' of the universe. Black holes cannot be seen because gravity is so strong that not even light can escape. Dark matter cannot be seen because its particles hardly interact with ordinary matter. What is the meaning of the dark side?



Lee Smolin is an American theoretical physicist, a researcher at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, and an adjunct professor of physics at the University of Waterloo. He is best known for his work in loop quantum gravity.


Closer to Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

[tomgrimes]

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!

[longcastle]

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

[thomascorbett]

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

[keither]

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.

[plantsindisguise]

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.

[Epoch]

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.

[videosbymathew]

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.

[nickgreen]

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.

[ESL-O.G.]

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?

[kevinhaynes]

"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...

[RikiB]

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!

[aguma]

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

[ColinGrym]

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.

[longcastle]

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...

[stoictraveler]

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.

[SarahKchannel]

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

[tonibat]

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").

[Bo-tznw]

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.

[snowkracker]

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.

[jayshearsyt]

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.