Tipler vs Krauss-- Skeptic Lecture overview

[Jay Hoover]

Yesterday was 2007's closing lecture @ the Sketpic Society (15 years now), and it was a "debate" between Frank Tipler (The Physics of Immortality, The Physics of Christianity) and Lawrence Krauss (The Physics of Star Trek, Quintessence).

Tipler, a very nice southern gentleman who is approachable, well mannered, oftentimes humorous, and apparently very well versed in relative phyics was, unfortunately, nearly incomprehensible to I think 90% of the lay audience, especially in the first part of his overview. The physics was simply overwhelming and he made reference to so many obscure relativistic models that as I looked around the audience, I saw a sea of wide-eyed dumbfounded jaw droppers. It was simply too much to comprehend.

For all I know, Tipler may be completely right, but for all his gentility, he isn't very good at popularizing it (his books are somewhat more readable, although also overwhelming with the physics). Now, the fact that his theories are not comprehensible to us laypeople is, I suppose, largely due to the fact that we're not relativistic phyicists nor are we likely to become such; in my brief chat with Dr Tipler I pointed out that while his book claims all the physics is accessible to anyone who cares to learn it, I am one of those individuals that finds higher math daunting and almost impossible to understand. I trust physicists, for the most part, to know what it is they are talking about and the evidence that they do is usually shown in how the technologies they help to cultivate actually works. I loved Tipler's epigraph on my copy of The Physics of Immortality: "See you at the Omega point!" --Frank Tipler.

Dr. Krauss was a breath of fresh, and emminently understable air. He was contrite to begin with, explaining that he didn't look forward to doing what he was there to do, which was to define for all us mathematical philistines that Tipler's entire premise was predicated on nonsense.

Krauss was detailed and vastly easier to understand. He explained things via a well-mounted power-point and was incredibly entertaining and funny. His rebuttal was couched in terms of the premises upon which Tipler bases his beliefs that there is a scientific support of the assertionm of God, and in particular Christianity, are themselves fallacious interpretations of various physical models, one that would lead us to conclude that we are in an oscillating universe (bang/expansion/collapse/ bang, etc.) and this is essential for the physics of immortality.

Krauss went through each point and showed that Tipler errs both in his interpretation of the data, but also in his level of assumptive "ifs". To Tipler's credit, he acknowledges that if the "ifs" (like his take on "The Theory of Everything", which he believes is already in effect, and his belief that Hawking's initial computations of black holes is correct, even htough Hawking himself disavows it as wrong) are indeed incorrect, then his theory fails. He's not emotional aobut this (not overtly), and one gets the sense that Tipler is used to being ganged-up on and takes it all with grace and the enduring agreement that "Science Rules".

This last bit, by the way, was on a T-shirt sported by Bill Nye, who also was in attendance.

One other point-- the audience was receptive and cordial; not a hint of hostility towards Tipler. He was warmly greeted, and warmly applauded.

[seldom wise]

I didn't follow all of Tipler's points but based on what I did understand it seems obvious that he knows full well that most of his claims are bs. The two capping stones were first, that Jesus was able to disappear and reappear thanks to the decomposition of neutrons and their reassembly,and second, that the world is ending in 50 years. There is no doubt at that moment that you have been had.

[Ion]

I was there, too [in the small side-room, alas!]. I followed much of what Tipler said on physics. My impression was that he was trying to 'snowblind' us with too much information. A lot of what he said at the beginning of his talk was irrelevant to his main arguments.

Here is a summary of his argument, as far as I can remember it:

- The Universe is closed in time, so it will eventually contract into a reverse Big-Bang
- That creates a singularity at the beginning of the Universe and another singularity (the 'omega' point of Teilhard de Chardin) at the end
- Singularities are outside of nature and do not follow nature's laws
- Therefore (!?) the singularities are God
- The two singularities are connected by many (infinite?) universes, corresponding to the multiple universe interpretation of Quantum Mechanics
- There is a third singularity underlying all these multiple universes
- Therefore, God is a Trinity: there are three singularities that are in fact the same [it is implicit, although he did not say it, that the 'alpha' singularity is the Father, the 'omega' singularity is the Holy Ghost, and the intermediate singularity is the Son]
- The Son singularity is common to all universes
- The Original Sin is a gene that makes us predisposed to agression
- The Original Sin gene was non-functional in the Virgin Mary and Jesus
- Jesus was born form a virgin, this is not a miracle because it happens sometimes in cordates - he challenged us to find more virgin mothers
- Therefore, Jesus had to be an XX male, because the Virgin Mary did not have a Y chromosome to give him
- Jesus resurrected by desintegrating his body into neutrinos. After that, he was able to integrate and desintegrate his body at will.
- The end of the world would come when people can be downloaded into computers. This will happen very soon, probably in 50 years.

This is not a 'proof' of Christianity, as it was billed to be. At best, is a rationalization of Christian belief, as Dr Krauss said. A worst, it is just pure non-sense.

[Jay Hoover]

I was there, too [in the small side-room, alas!]. I followed much of what Tipler said on physics. My impression was that he was trying to 'snowblind' us with too much information. A lot of what he said at the beginning of his talk was irrelevant to his main arguments.

Here is a summary of his argument, as far as I can remember it:

- The Universe is closed in time, so it will eventually contract into a reverse Big-Bang
- That creates a singularity at the beginning of the Universe and another singularity (the 'omega' point of Teilhard de Chardin) at the end
- Singularities are outside of nature and do not follow nature's laws
- Therefore (!?) the singularities are God
- The two singularities are connected by many (infinite?) universes, corresponding to the multiple universe interpretation of Quantum Mechanics
- There is a third singularity underlying all these multiple universes
- Therefore, God is a Trinity: there are three singularities that are in fact the same [it is implicit, although he did not say it, that the 'alpha' singularity is the Father, the 'omega' singularity is the Holy Ghost, and the intermediate singularity is the Son]
- The Son singularity is common to all universes
- The Original Sin is a gene that makes us predisposed to agression
- The Original Sin gene was non-functional in the Virgin Mary and Jesus
- Jesus was born form a virgin, this is not a miracle because it happens sometimes in cordates - he challenged us to find more virgin mothers
- Therefore, Jesus had to be an XX male, because the Virgin Mary did not have a Y chromosome to give him
- Jesus resurrected by desintegrating his body into neutrinos. After that, he was able to integrate and desintegrate his body at will.
- The end of the world would come when people can be downloaded into computers. This will happen very soon, probably in 50 years.

This is not a 'proof' of Christianity, as it was billed to be. At best, is a rationalization of Christian belief, as Dr Krauss said. A worst, it is just pure non-sense.

Great recap!

All of this was understandable; but the prelimnary stuff was just beyond me.

[Articulett]

Thanks guys--I wish I was there. You did a fine job of explaining. I like Krauss myself. Those who can you science to clarify and simplify and draw wonder are my heroes. Those who use it to obfuscate and stir up "mystery" are my nemesis. I've been there, done that. It just ain't satisfying.

[Ion]

I usually manage to place a question in the Caltech talks. Not this time. I was in the side room, watching the debate in a small TV. I also had just given my own talk that morning, on "Meditation and Consciousness", and had a 45 min session of Q&A afterwards. Anyway, these are some of the question I would like to ask:

- Would it be possible to build this type of rationalization for other religions?
- Dr. Krauss, what do you think of the interpretation of Quantum Mechanics that say the consciousness is the ultimate reality, proposed, for example, by Henry Stapp (“Mind, Matter and Quantum Mechanics”) and Evans Harris Walker (“The Physics of Consciousness”)
- Dr. Tiper, would that interpretation agree or disagree with your justification of Christianity?
- Dr. Tiper, how many Christians do you think would accept your ideas? For example, that Jesus was XX and therefore, technically, a female?

[Martin Brock]

Yesterday was 2007's closing lecture @ the Sketpic Society (15 years now), and it was a "debate" between Frank Tipler (The Physics of Immortality, The Physics of Christianity) and Lawrence Krauss (The Physics of Star Trek, Quintessence).

I tried to read The Physics of Immortality years ago but didn't get very far. Tipler begins with a premise I accept, that the "soul" (or "mind") is essentially information or information processing reducible to the formal operations of a Turing machine or equivalent system, so in principle, a human "soul" could be "downloaded into a computer". I emphasize "in principle", because accomplishing the feat is hardly trivial, and I certainly don't expect it to happen in 50 years if it ever does. This "soul copying" does not transfer a human consciousness from one vessel to another. It creates two vessels with two souls, both presumably conscious and both equally convinced (with equal validity) of continuity with the original. "Which is the original?" is an essentially meaningless question. We could ask both conscious beings, "Are you the original?" Both would answer, "Yes," and both (or neither) would be correct.

Tipler imagines descendants of humanity somehow "resurrecting" all human souls at the "omega point", an event in space-time at which the information capacity of the Universe grows explosively near the end of its gravitational collapse in a reversal of the Big Bang. I don't follow this reasoning or understand why an explosion of information capacity is necessary. He doesn't say so, but Tipler seems to predict the resurrection of every soul in every possible state, so we all end up spending eternity in the most horrifying hell and the most idyllic heaven simultaneously. I'll stick with mortality.

Tipler certainly doesn't "prove Christianity" with modern physics, but he does demonstrate, very legitimately, that modern physics doesn't prove the impossibility of "resurrected souls" either. In fact, modern physics doesn't prove much of anything outside of its narrow domain. Physics is not a "theory of everything" and never could be. It's more like the theory of an erector set from which many things can be built. Understanding this theory is not understanding "everything" any more than understanding the Turing Machine (or any programming language) is understanding every possible algorithm. Turing Machines can be constructed from many other "erector sets" (described by other "laws of physics"), so Physics doesn't account for "the soul", specifically, at all. The Theory of Everything is an incredible arrogance of Physics worshipers, just as Bible worshipers believe their system to be last word on God.

[Martin Brock]

I usually manage to place a question in the Caltech talks. Not this time. I was in the side room, watching the debate in a small TV. I also had just given my own talk that morning, on "Meditation and Consciousness", and had a 45 min session of Q&A afterwards. Anyway, these are some of the question I would like to ask:

Can't answer for Tipler, but I'm killing time before it kills me, so here's my two cents worth.

- Would it be possible to build this type of rationalization for other religions?

Yes.

- Dr. Krauss, what do you think of the interpretation of Quantum Mechanics that say the consciousness is the ultimate reality, proposed, for example, by Henry Stapp (“Mind, Matter and Quantum Mechanics”) and Evans Harris Walker (“The Physics of Consciousness”)

These people don't explain consciousness any better than Tipler, and they don't explain Quantum Mechanics well either. QM is less mysterious than the QM mystics believe it to be, and I doubt that it has any direct bearing on consciousness. The sects of scientism are many and varied.

- Dr. Tiper, would that interpretation agree or disagree with your justification of Christianity?

I suppose he doesn't accept the "soul is Quantum Mechanical" idea, because Turing Machines and equivalent systems (including various non-deterministic models) don't require QM.

- Dr. Tiper, how many Christians do you think would accept your ideas? For example, that Jesus was XX and therefore, technically, a female?

Most Christians wouldn't accept his understanding of "soul" if they understood it, but they'll happily accept his ideas as long as they don't understand them, and this willingness is the measure of his success.

I suppose Jesus was XY and conceived in the usual way. Neither Paul's letters nor the earliest (Mark) and latest (John) gospels have a virgin birth, and Jesus makes no reference to his own miraculous conception anywhere. The virgin birth is one of the least canonical ideas in Christianity. Christians give it such a preeminent place, because they're avoiding other ideas that make challenging demands on their lives.

[Martin Brock]

I was there, too [in the small side-room, alas!]. I followed much of what Tipler said on physics. My impression was that he was trying to 'snowblind' us with too much information. A lot of what he said at the beginning of his talk was irrelevant to his main arguments.

Here is a summary of his argument, as far as I can remember it:

- The Universe is closed in time, so it will eventually contract into a reverse Big-Bang
- That creates a singularity at the beginning of the Universe and another singularity (the 'omega' point of Teilhard de Chardin) at the end
- Singularities are outside of nature and do not follow nature's laws
- Therefore (!?) the singularities are God

I hesitate to speak for Tipler, but I don't think he identifies the Cosmological singularity with God. An observer "outside" of a gravitational collapse to a singularity sees the collapse occur in finite time. An observer "inside" the collapse experiences an eternity, and Tipler asserts something he calls "infinite information capacity" within this eternity. This infinite information capacity somehow enables the resurrection of all souls that ever existed.

In Special Relativity, an observer approaching the speed of light can also experience an eternity while a stationary observer experiences a finite time.

- The two singularities are connected by many (infinite?) universes, corresponding to the multiple universe interpretation of Quantum Mechanics

"Many universes" is a contradiction in terms, but the "space" experienced by an observer "inside" a gravitational collapse is much "larger" than the space experienced by an observer outside. In a sense, the inside observer's yardstick shrinks, so he measures more space than the outside observer.

The metric in a reference frame approaching the speed of light similarly shrinks in the direction of motion, so a stationary observer measures smaller extents in the moving reference frame (with his "larger yardstick") than a moving observer.

- There is a third singularity underlying all these multiple universes
- Therefore, God is a Trinity: there are three singularities that are in fact the same [it is implicit, although he did not say it, that the 'alpha' singularity is the Father, the 'omega' singularity is the Holy Ghost, and the intermediate singularity is the Son]
- The Son singularity is common to all universes
- The Original Sin is a gene that makes us predisposed to agression
- The Original Sin gene was non-functional in the Virgin Mary and Jesus
- Jesus was born form a virgin, this is not a miracle because it happens sometimes in cordates - he challenged us to find more virgin mothers
- Therefore, Jesus had to be an XX male, because the Virgin Mary did not have a Y chromosome to give him
- Jesus resurrected by desintegrating his body into neutrinos. After that, he was able to integrate and desintegrate his body at will.
- The end of the world would come when people can be downloaded into computers. This will happen very soon, probably in 50 years.

This is not a 'proof' of Christianity, as it was billed to be. At best, is a rationalization of Christian belief, as Dr Krauss said. A worst, it is just pure non-sense.

If Tipler discusses this stuff in The Physics of Immortality, I didn't get so far in the book. I agree that he rationalizes Christianity without "proving" anything, but he effectively demonstrates that physics doesn't "disprove" many things. If you want to construct a plausible (if not a persuasive) theory of "resurrected souls", you can do it without violating any "laws of physics".

These theories may be entirely untestable and thus unscientific, but they are not counter-scientific, i.e. the theories don't contradict any proposition we can test empirically. In Cosmology (and astrophysics more generally), most nominally "scientific" theories are actually in this category. The models are consistent with (do not contradict) a local (in time and space) physics we can test, but actually testing the theories is very difficult if not impossible. "Doesn't contradict the standard model" is a far cry from "true", because the standard scientific model doesn't describe very much. Rigorous science is highly myopic in reality.

[Jay Hoover]

Tipler certainly doesn't "prove Christianity" with modern physics, but he does demonstrate, very legitimately, that modern physics doesn't prove the impossibility of "resurrected souls" either.

In his "Physics of Christianity", Tipler does, in fact, claim that physics proves Christianity.

The Theory of Everything is an incredible arrogance of Physics worshipers, just as Bible worshipers believe their system to be last word on God.

Tipler quite clearly claims there is a Theory of Everything, and his entire premise is based on it. Tipler is unabashedly Christian, so your statement would be more accurate to read, in this case, "The Theory of Everything is an incredible arrogance of this Christian physicist, Frank Tipler."

[Jay Hoover]

If Tipler discusses this stuff in The Physics of Immortality, I didn't get so far in the book.

He doesn't discuss this in "The Physics of Immortality", he discusses it in its sequel, "The Physics of Christianity".

Maybe you should read them both?

[Martin Brock]

Tipler certainly doesn't "prove Christianity" with modern physics, but he does demonstrate, very legitimately, that modern physics doesn't prove the impossibility of "resurrected souls" either.

In his "Physics of Christianity", Tipler does, in fact, claim that physics proves Christianity.

O.K. I haven't read it. Like I say, he doesn't prove Christianity.

The Theory of Everything is an incredible arrogance of Physics worshipers, just as Bible worshipers believe their system to be last word on God.

Tipler quite clearly claims there is a Theory of Everything, and his entire premise is based on it. Tipler is unabashedly Christian, so your statement would be more accurate to read, in this case, "The Theory of Everything is an incredible arrogance of this Christian physicist, Frank Tipler."

I don't know what he thinks of a Theory of Everything. My statement refers to any physicist who imagines a Theory of Everything. Einstein imagined a Unified Field Theory, but he wasn't arrogant enough to call it a "Theory of Everything".

[Martin Brock]

If Tipler discusses this stuff in The Physics of Immortality, I didn't get so far in the book.

He doesn't discuss this in "The Physics of Immortality", he discusses it in its sequel, "The Physics of Christianity".

Maybe you should read them both?

I couldn't get through the first. I'll pass on the second.

[ruprecht]

... Those who can you science to clarify and simplify and draw wonder are my heroes. Those who use it to obfuscate and stir up "mystery" are my nemesis. I've been there, done that. It just ain't satisfying.

are you sure you know the meaning of "nemesis" ? And yet you've been there, like them, and done that. Still doing that obfuscation, but you're not stirring up any mysteries.

Dictionary.com

nem·e·sis /ˈnɛməsɪs/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[nem-uh-sis] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun, plural -ses /-ˌsiz/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[-seez] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation.
1. something that a person cannot conquer, achieve, etc.: The performance test proved to be my nemesis.
2. an opponent or rival whom a person cannot best or overcome.
3. (initial capital letter) Classical Mythology. the goddess of divine retribution.
4. an agent or act of retribution or punishment.
[Origin: < L < Gk némesis lit., a dealing out, verbid of némein to dispense (justice); see -sis]

—Synonyms 1. Waterloo. 4. downfall, undoing, ruin, Waterloo.

this sense of wonder you refer to is indeed the same as a tourist may experience looking upon the leaning tower. unfamiliar with the concepts involved. educate yourself, and lose the mystery.

[Robot Mirror]

I took a lot of photos of the event, and while I'm not sure yet how to post photographs on this forum, you can see photos of both Krauss, and Tipler, (and Shermer) during the debate at the link below:

http://flickr.com/photos/robertmiller/s ... 328223158/

(Along with a few photographs of the beautiful campus of Cal-Tech).

[Martin Brock]

In Special Relativity, an observer approaching the speed of light can also experience an eternity while a stationary observer experiences a finite time.

Correction: The stationary observer can experience an eternity while the observer approaching the speed of light experiences a finite time.

[JamesRedford]

In Special Relativity, an observer approaching the speed of light can also experience an eternity while a stationary observer experiences a finite time.

Correction: The stationary observer can experience an eternity while the observer approaching the speed of light experiences a finite time.

Motion and the time dilation effect are relative to the objects. Two observers moving relative to each other will experience the other person's clock to be ticking slower than their own. If their relative motion is at the speed of light, then each person will observe the other's clock to have stopped.

For more on that, see Brian Greene, The Elegant Universe (New York: W. W. Norton, 1999), pp. 43-46, especially pp. 45-46.

If the objects' inertial frames of reference are different, then time will move slower for the object which experiences greater acceleration (with deceleration being included as part of the term "acceleration").

[JamesRedford]

Yesterday was 2007's closing lecture @ the Sketpic Society (15 years now), and it was a "debate" between Frank Tipler (The Physics of Immortality, The Physics of Christianity) and Lawrence Krauss (The Physics of Star Trek, Quintessence).

Tipler, a very nice southern gentleman who is approachable, well mannered, oftentimes humorous, and apparently very well versed in relative phyics was, unfortunately, nearly incomprehensible to I think 90% of the lay audience, especially in the first part of his overview. The physics was simply overwhelming and he made reference to so many obscure relativistic models that as I looked around the audience, I saw a sea of wide-eyed dumbfounded jaw droppers. It was simply too much to comprehend.

For all I know, Tipler may be completely right, but for all his gentility, he isn't very good at popularizing it (his books are somewhat more readable, although also overwhelming with the physics). Now, the fact that his theories are not comprehensible to us laypeople is, I suppose, largely due to the fact that we're not relativistic phyicists nor are we likely to become such; in my brief chat with Dr Tipler I pointed out that while his book claims all the physics is accessible to anyone who cares to learn it, I am one of those individuals that finds higher math daunting and almost impossible to understand. I trust physicists, for the most part, to know what it is they are talking about and the evidence that they do is usually shown in how the technologies they help to cultivate actually works. I loved Tipler's epigraph on my copy of The Physics of Immortality: "See you at the Omega point!" --Frank Tipler.

Dr. Krauss was a breath of fresh, and emminently understable air. He was contrite to begin with, explaining that he didn't look forward to doing what he was there to do, which was to define for all us mathematical philistines that Tipler's entire premise was predicated on nonsense.

Krauss was detailed and vastly easier to understand. He explained things via a well-mounted power-point and was incredibly entertaining and funny. His rebuttal was couched in terms of the premises upon which Tipler bases his beliefs that there is a scientific support of the assertionm of God, and in particular Christianity, are themselves fallacious interpretations of various physical models, one that would lead us to conclude that we are in an oscillating universe (bang/expansion/collapse/ bang, etc.) and this is essential for the physics of immortality.

Krauss went through each point and showed that Tipler errs both in his interpretation of the data, but also in his level of assumptive "ifs". To Tipler's credit, he acknowledges that if the "ifs" (like his take on "The Theory of Everything", which he believes is already in effect, and his belief that Hawking's initial computations of black holes is correct, even htough Hawking himself disavows it as wrong) are indeed incorrect, then his theory fails. He's not emotional aobut this (not overtly), and one gets the sense that Tipler is used to being ganged-up on and takes it all with grace and the enduring agreement that "Science Rules".

This last bit, by the way, was on a T-shirt sported by Bill Nye, who also was in attendance.

One other point-- the audience was receptive and cordial; not a hint of hostility towards Tipler. He was warmly greeted, and warmly applauded.

Prof. Lawrence Krauss in his review of Prof. Frank J. Tipler's book The Physics of Christianity ("More dangerous than nonsense," New Scientist, Issue 2603, May 12, 2007 http://genesis1.phys.cwru.edu/~krauss/Tiplerreview.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ) doesn't give anyone any reason for thinking he (Krauss) is correct. Instead, Krauss repeatedly commits the logical fallacy of bare assertion.

Krauss gives no indication that he followed up on the endnotes in the book The Physics of Christianity and actually read Prof. Tipler's physics journal papers. All Krauss is going off of in said review is Tipler's mostly non-technical popular-audience book The Physics of Christianity without researching Tipler's technical papers in the physics journals. Krauss's review offers no actual lines of reasoning for Krauss's pronouncements. His readership is simply expected to imbibe what Krauss proclaims, even though it's clear that Krauss is merely critiquing a popular-audience book which does not attempt to present the rigorous technical details. Krauss's bare assertions and absence of reasoning in his review have no place in actual science.

Whereas Tipler gives detailed arguments for the existence of the Omega Point and the Feynman-Weinberg quantum gravity/Standard Model Theory of Everything which soundly refute Krauss's bare assertions. See F. J. Tipler, "The structure of the world from pure numbers," Reports on Progress in Physics, Vol. 68, No. 4 (April 2005), pp. 897-964. http://math.tulane.edu/~tipler/theoryofeverything.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Also released as "Feynman-Weinberg Quantum Gravity and the Extended Standard Model as a Theory of Everything," arXiv:0704.3276, April 24, 2007. http://arxiv.org/abs/0704.3276" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Quite ironically, Krauss has actually published a paper that greatly helped to strengthen Tipler's Omega Point Theory. See Profs. Lawrence M. Krauss and Michael S. Turner, "Geometry and Destiny" (General Relativity and Gravitation, Vol. 31, No. 10 [October 1999], pp. 1453-1459; also at arXiv:astro-ph/9904020, April 1, 1999 http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/9904020" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ), which demonstrates that there is no set of cosmological observations which can tell us whether the universe will expand forever or eventually collapse.

This isn't the first time that has happened to critics of Tipler's Omega Point Theory. In a previous paper published by Prof. George Ellis and Dr. David Coule criticizing Tipler's Omega Point Theory ("Life at the end of the universe?," General Relativity and Gravitation, Vol. 26, No. 7 [July 1994], pp. 731-739), Ellis and Coule gave an argument that the Bekenstein Bound violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics if the universe collapses without having event horizons eliminated. Unwittingly, Ellis and Coule thereby actually gave a powerful argument that the Omega Point is required by the laws of physics.

So when Tipler's critics actually do real physics instead of issuing bare assertions and mystically nebulous cavils (the latter in Ellis's case, since Ellis is a theist who thinks that physics cannot be capable of explaining human consciousness), they end up making Tipler's case stronger. I find that deliciously ironic. (Ironic though it is, it's the expected result, given that the Omega Point is required by the known laws of physics.)

So never say that God doesn't have a profoundly keen sense of humor.

And on the matter of God: God has been proven to exist based upon the most reserved view of the known laws of physics. For much more on that, see Prof. Frank J. Tipler's below paper, which among other things demonstrates that the known laws of physics (i.e., the Second Law of Thermodynamics, general relativity, quantum mechanics, and the Standard Model of particle physics) require that the universe end in the Omega Point (the final cosmological singularity and state of infinite informational capacity identified as being God):

F. J. Tipler, "The structure of the world from pure numbers," Reports on Progress in Physics, Vol. 68, No. 4 (April 2005), pp. 897-964. http://math.tulane.edu/~tipler/theoryofeverything.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Also released as "Feynman-Weinberg Quantum Gravity and the Extended Standard Model as a Theory of Everything," arXiv:0704.3276, April 24, 2007. http://arxiv.org/abs/0704.3276" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Out of 50 articles, Prof. Tipler's above paper was selected as one of 12 for the "Highlights of 2005" accolade as "the very best articles published in Reports on Progress in Physics in 2005 [Vol. 68]. Articles were selected by the Editorial Board for their outstanding reviews of the field. They all received the highest praise from our international referees and a high number of downloads from the journal Website." (See Richard Palmer, Publisher, "Highlights of 2005," Reports on Progress in Physics. http://www.iop.org/EJ/journal/-page=ext ... /0034-4885" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; )

Reports on Progress in Physics is the leading journal of the Institute of Physics, Britain's main professional body for physicists. Further, Reports on Progress in Physics has a higher impact factor (according to Journal Citation Reports) than Physical Review Letters, which is the most prestigious American physics journal (one, incidently, which Prof. Tipler has been published in more than once). A journal's impact factor reflects the importance the science community places in that journal in the sense of actually citing its papers in their own papers. (And just to point out, Tipler's 2005 Reports on Progress in Physics paper could not have been published in Physical Review Letters since said paper is nearly book-length, and hence not a "letter" as defined by the latter journal.)

See also the below resource for further information on the Omega Point Theory:

Theophysics: God is the Ultimate Physicist http://geocities.com/theophysics/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Tipler is Professor of Mathematics and Physics (joint appointment) at Tulane University. His Ph.D. is in the field of global general relativity (the same rarefied field that Profs. Roger Penrose and Stephen Hawking developed), and he is also an expert in particle physics and computer science. His Omega Point Theory has been published in a number of prestigious peer-reviewed physics and science journals in addition to Reports on Progress in Physics, such as Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (one of the world's leading astrophysics journals), Physics Letters B, the International Journal of Theoretical Physics, etc.

Prof. John A. Wheeler (the father of most relativity research in the U.S.) wrote that "Frank Tipler is widely known for important concepts and theorems in general relativity and gravitation physics" on pg. viii in the "Foreword" to The Anthropic Cosmological Principle (1986) by cosmologist Prof. John D. Barrow and Tipler, which was the first book wherein Tipler's Omega Point Theory was described. On pg. ix of said book, Prof. Wheeler wrote that Chapter 10 of the book, which concerns the Omega Point Theory, "rivals in thought-provoking power any of the [other chapters]."

The leading quantum physicist in the world, Prof. David Deutsch (inventor of the quantum computer, being the first person to mathematically describe the workings of such a device, and winner of the Institute of Physics' 1998 Paul Dirac Medal and Prize for his work), endorses the physics of the Omega Point Theory in his book The Fabric of Reality (1997). For that, see:

David Deutsch, extracts from Chapter 14: "The Ends of the Universe" of The Fabric of Reality: The Science of Parallel Universes--and Its Implications (London: Allen Lane The Penguin Press, 1997), ISBN: 0713990619; with additional comments by Frank J. Tipler. http://geocities.com/theophysics/deutsc ... verse.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The only way to avoid the Omega Point cosmology is to resort to physical theories which have no experimental support and which violate the known laws of physics, such as with Prof. Stephen Hawking's paper on the black hole information issue which is dependent on the conjectured string theory-based anti-de Sitter space/conformal field theory correspondence (AdS/CFT correspondence). See S. W. Hawking, "Information loss in black holes," Physical Review D, Vol. 72, No. 8, 084013 (October 2005); also at arXiv:hep-th/0507171, July 18, 2005. http://arxiv.org/abs/hep-th/0507171" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That is, Prof. Hawking's paper is based upon empirically unconfirmed physics which violate the known laws of physics. It's an impressive testament to the Omega Point Theory's correctness, as Hawking implicitly confirms that the known laws of physics require the universe to collapse in finite time. Hawking realizes that the black hole information issue must be resolved without violating unitarity, yet he's forced to abandon the known laws of physics in order to avoid unitarity violation without the universe collapsing.

Some have suggested that the universe's current acceleration of its expansion obviates the universe collapsing (and therefore obviates the Omega Point). But as mentioned above, as Profs. Lawrence M. Krauss and Michael S. Turner point out in "Geometry and Destiny" (General Relativity and Gravitation, Vol. 31, No. 10 [October 1999], pp. 1453-1459; also at arXiv:astro-ph/9904020, April 1, 1999 http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/9904020" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ), there is no set of cosmological observations which can tell us whether the universe will expand forever or eventually collapse.

There's a very good reason for that, because that is dependant on the actions of intelligent life. The known laws of physics provide the mechanism for the universe's collapse. As required by the Standard Model, the net baryon number was created in the early universe by baryogenesis via electroweak quantum tunneling. This necessarily forces the Higgs field to be in a vacuum state that is not its absolute vacuum, which is the cause of the positive cosmological constant. But if the baryons in the universe were to be annihilated by the inverse of baryogenesis, again via electroweak quantum tunneling (which is allowed in the Standard Model, as B - L is conserved), then this would force the Higgs field toward its absolute vacuum, cancelling the positive cosmological constant and thereby forcing the universe to collapse. Moreover, this process would provide the ideal form of energy resource and rocket propulsion during the colonization phase of the universe.

Prof. Tipler's above 2005 Reports on Progress in Physics paper also demonstrates that the correct quantum gravity theory has existed since 1962, first discovered by Richard Feynman in that year, and independently discovered by Steven Weinberg and Bryce DeWitt, among others. But because these physicists were looking for equations with a finite number of terms (i.e., derivatives no higher than second order), they abandoned this qualitatively unique quantum gravity theory since in order for it to be consistent it requires an arbitrarily higher number of terms. Further, they didn't realize that this proper theory of quantum gravity is consistent only with a certain set of boundary conditions imposed (which includes the initial Big Bang, and the final Omega Point, cosmological singularities). The equations for this theory of quantum gravity are term-by-term finite, but the same mechanism that forces each term in the series to be finite also forces the entire series to be infinite (i.e., infinities that would otherwise occur in spacetime, consequently destabilizing it, are transferred to the cosmological singularities, thereby preventing the universe from immediately collapsing into nonexistence). As Tipler notes in his 2007 book The Physics of Christianity (pp. 49 and 279), "It is a fundamental mathematical fact that this [infinite series] is the best that we can do. ... This is somewhat analogous to Liouville's theorem in complex analysis, which says that all analytic functions other than constants have singularities either a finite distance from the origin of coordinates or at infinity."

When combined with the Standard Model, the result is the Theory of Everything (TOE) correctly describing and unifying all the forces in physics.

[Martin Brock]

Motion and the time dilation effect are relative to the objects. Two observers moving relative to each other will experience the other person's clock to be ticking slower than their own. If their relative motion is at the speed of light, then each person will observe the other's clock to have stopped.

If you watch your twin brother moving away from you at speeds approaching the speed of light, and if he then returns to you, he ages less than you. So Einstein claims. If he observes your clock ticking more slowly, this observation seems illusory.

[JamesRedford]

What follows are my notes and commentary for this debate between physicist and mathematician Prof. Frank J. Tipler and physicist Prof. Lawrence M. Krauss.

In his presentation, Prof. Tipler discusses the Omega Point cosmology, which is a proof (i.e., mathematical theorem) of God's existence per the known laws of physics (i.e., the Second Law of Thermodynamics, General Relativity, and Quantum Mechanics), and the Feynman-DeWitt-Weinberg quantum gravity/Standard Model Theory of Everything (TOE), which is also required by the known laws of physics.

The times given below are for the following video of the debate:

Frank Tipler and Lawrence Krauss, Michael Shermer (Producer), A Great Debate: Can Physics Prove God and Christianity? (prod. co.: Skeptics Society [Altadena, Cal.]), run time: 2:13 h:min. Video of a debate held at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech; Pasadena, Cal.) on June 3, 2007.

For much more regarding the matters here, see my following article:

James Redford, "The Physics of God and the Quantum Gravity Theory of Everything", Social Science Research Network (SSRN), Sept. 10, 2012 (orig. pub. Dec. 19, 2011), 186 pp., doi:10.2139/ssrn.1974708, http://ssrn.com/abstract=1974708" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; , http://archive.org/download/ThePhysicsO ... of-God.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; , http://theophysics.host56.com/Redford-P ... of-God.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; , http://alphaomegapoint.files.wordpress. ... of-god.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; , http://sites.google.com/site/physicothe ... of-God.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

####################

Michael Shermer (founder of the Skeptics Society) is the moderator of the debate. Bill Nye (of Bill Nye the Science Guy) is among the audience members.


Prof. Tipler starts his presentation at 15:57 min:sec. Tipler points out that we have had a Theory of Everything (TOE) in physics for some 30 years with the arrival of the Standard Model of particle physics, since the Standard Model describes all forces in nature except for gravity. The Standard Model is a quantum field theory, i.e., it involves Quantum Mechanics combined with special-relativistic particle physics. And gravity is described by General Relativity. The problem has been to make General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics consistent with each other, which Tipler points out is done with the Feynman-DeWitt-Weinberg theory of quantum gravity when the appropriate boundary conditions on the universe are used, which includes the initial Big Bang, and the final Omega Point, cosmological singularities.

Tipler shows a graphic listing General Relativity as having the general linear group of GL(4, R) symmetry group; and the Standard Model of particle physics as having the Lie group of 3 Lie symmetry group.

19:33 min:sec ff.: In the 1960s Richard Feynman at Caltech quantized a spin-2 field using his path integral method. Quantizing a spin-2 field requires it to be a spacetime metric and imposes the full GL(4, R) symmetry group.

At 19:54 min:sec ff., Tipler points out that the Feynman quantum gravity theory is unique, i.e., it is the only quantum gravity theory possible if General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics are correct (cf. 32:11 min:sec ff.), since General Relativity requires gravity to be a spin-2 field, and the Hulse and Taylor pulsar confirmation of Einstein's quadrupole formula verified that gravity is a spin-2 field. General Relativity also states that gravity is a phenomenon of the curvature of the spacetime metric with observer independence, i.e., physics cannot depend locally on the observer, which gives the GL(4, R) symmetry group of General Relativity.

20:44 min:sec ff.: Steven Weinberg later showed that the Feynman theory of quantum gravity is renormalizable, which means that the term-by-term infinities in the Feynman diagrams can be absorbed into constants, so it is no worse than other quantum field theories. However, there are actually two sources of infinity in quantum field theory: the ones that are renormalized away, as previously mentioned; and the ones that generate the divergence of the power series of the S-matrix (i.e., scattering matrix).

21:21 min:sec ff.: It has been known for 50 years what the cause of this series divergence is: it's a bad choice of the vacuum state, which Freeman Dyson showed in a paper in Physical Review in 1952 (see F. J. Dyson, "Divergence of Perturbation Theory in Quantum Electrodynamics", Physical Review, Vol. 85, No. 4 [Feb. 1952], pp. 631-632). David Geroch showed that perturbation theory in String Theory also has a series divergence for essentially the same reason.

22:18 min:sec ff.: Tipler mentions Liouville's Theorem in complex analysis. One way of stating said Theorem is that all analytic functions (i.e., holomorphic functions) other than constants have singularities either a finite distance from the origin of coordinates or at infinity, which is analogous to what occurs with the universe: the only way to avoid infinities in spacetime (consequently causing the instantaneous collapse of the entire universe) is for the universe to begin and end at singularities. Moreover, it doesn't matter what form of physics one resorts to, as any physically-realistic cosmology (e.g., one capable of incorporating Quantum Mechanics, since the complex number field is intrinsic to the mathematical formulations of Quantum Mechanics) must begin at an initial singularity and end at a final singularity. (As Barrow and Tipler wrote, "Initial and final cosmological curvature singularities are required to avoid a universal action singularity." See John D. Barrow and Frank J. Tipler, "Action principles in nature", Nature, Vol. 331, No. 6151 [Jan. 7, 1988], pp. 31-34; see also Frank J. Tipler, "The Structure of the Classical Cosmological Singularity", in Origin and Early History of the Universe: Proceedings of the 26th Liège International Astrophyscial Colloquium, July 1-4, 1986 [Cointe-Ougree, Belgium: Universite de Liege, Institut d'Astrophysique, 1987], pp. 339-359; "Discussion", pp. 360-361.)

23:23 min:sec ff.: Feynman quantum gravity makes a singularity even more inevitable than the Penrose-Hawking-Geroch Singularity Theorems, since the Singularity Theorems assume attractive gravity, whereas with Feynman quantum gravity the sum-over-histories (i.e., sum-over-paths; path integral formulation) get arbitrarily close to infinite curvature. In other words, the multiverse has its own singularity.

24:04 min:sec ff.: Imposing unitarity avoids the spacetime infinities of quantum field theory, since if there were not a cut-off to the energies of quantum field theory then miniature black holes would be created and quickly evaporate, thereby violating unitarity. 25:12 min:sec ff.: This energy cut-off mechanism also means that some misnomered "constants" increase with cosmic time. 26:21 min:sec ff.: This mechanism to stabilize quantum field theory only works if there is an initial singularity and a final singularity and if there are no event horizons, which also solves the black hole information problem. 26:55 min:sec ff.: The absence of event horizons is only possible if the universe is spatially close, and in particular has the spatial topology of a three-sphere (i.e., 3-sphere; S^3); also, only if the final singularity is a single point in the Penrose c-boundary construction, called the Omega Point.

27:18 min:sec ff.: This picks out a global vacuum state which must define a classical universe now; this means that the wave function of the universe must have initially been a Dirac delta function, which explains the observed flatness of the universe without resorting to nonempirical new physics such as Inflation Theory (requiring the unobserved inflation field, i.e., inflaton particles), but rather is simply quantum kinematics: a result of wave-packet spreading (as an analogy, Tipler gives a version of wave-packet spreading as sound waves heard around the corner of a building, which is an example of wave diffraction).

28:05 min:sec ff.: In such a universe, quantum field theory in the form of the Bekenstein Bound forces the initial state of the universe to be homogeneous and isotropic; and it also picks out a unique field of the Standard Model, the SU(2)_L field which gives the observed excess of matter over antimatter, whereas the usual boundary condition used by physicists--which is inconsistent with quantum field theory--gives a baryon-generating mechanism that produces far too many photons to baryons. Also, the perturbation spectrum is necessarily scale-invariant since the universe is necessarily flat (as was basically shown by Edward Robert Harrison long before Inflation Theory was even though of).

29 min ff.: What the above all means is that reality consists of a multiverse, with each universe in the multiverse starting at an initial singularity and eventually collapsing into a final singularity. Said Big Bang initial singularity and Omega Point final singularity are actually connected by a third singularity: the All-Presents singularity, which exists at each time for each universe in the multiverse. That is, there exists three connected hypostases to existence: the First Cause, the Sustaining Cause, and the Final Cause, which are not in spacetime but instead are the boundary of space and time, and which are not themselves subject to any possible form of physics, i.e., they are quite literally supernatural.

32:11 min:sec ff.: Feynman-Weinberg quantum gravity is the unique quantization of General Relativity, i.e., it's the only way to quantize General Relativity, since gravity in General Relativity is a spin-2 field, and General Relativity is a spacetime metric and possesses the full GL(4, R) symmetry group. (Herein "unique" means the only one mathematically possible within the context of parsimony, as one can always add arbitrary yet small terms which change the output so insignificantly that no current instruments can measure the difference, and hence it would presently still conform to experiment, but such arbitrary terms would not then be parsimonious, since they are not justified by mathematical necessity [i.e., in order to obtain a mathematically-consistent theory] nor are they experimentally justified.) General Relativity is the unique specialization (i.e., subset; special case) of Newtonian mechanics with the specification imposed that Newtonian mechanics be consistent with Maxwell's Equations, i.e., that the speed of light is the same for all observers. Elie Cartan showed that in Newtonian mechanics, gravity is curvature of time only; whereas in General Relativity, gravity is curvature of space and time, i.e., spacetime (cf. Frank J. Tipler, The Physics of Christianity [New York: Doubleday, 2007], p. 33; and pp. 79-80 of Frank J. Tipler, "Albert Einstein: A Scientific Reactionary", pp. 73-83, in John Brockman [Ed.], My Einstein [New York: Vintage Books, 2007; orig. pub. 2006]). 33 min ff.: Similarly, Quantum Mechanics is the unique specialization of Newtonian mechanics in its most powerful formulation, the Hamilton-Jacobi Equation, with the specification imposed that determinism is maintained: since the Hamilton-Jacobi Equation is indeterministic, because when particle trajectories cross paths a singularity is produced (i.e., the values in the equations become infinite) and so it is not possible to predict (even in principle) what happens after that (cf. id., The Physics of Christianity, pp. 48-49; and 7:17 min:sec ff. of Casey Luskin, interview of Frank Tipler, "Part 1: Einstein Vs. Darwin", Intelligent Design the Future, Feb. 13, 2013, audio run time: 17:25 min:sec).

33:17 min:sec ff.: For these reasons--the fact that the history of physics since Newton has been a series of specializations, rather than generalizations, of fundamental physics--we can be confident that we have the correct Theory of Everything (TOE) in physics and that there is not going to be any new physics that comes along to displace the current known laws of physics. That is, since after Newton's physics, there has been no "revolution" in physics (e.g., such as with General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics, etc.), but instead an evolution of physics: the fundamental physics of today are simply more specific subsets of Newtonian mechanics, i.e., Newtonian mechanics with specific constrains put on it in order to make it consistent with observations and to make its resulting subsets mutually mathematically consistent with each other. So in over 300 years we have never left the realm of Newton's physics. And all the forces in physics are now described and made mutually consistent with the Feynman-DeWitt-Weinberg quantum gravity theory and the Standard Model of particle physics.

Prof. Tipler then goes on to show how, using only the known laws of physics, the miracles of Jesus Christ are physically possible. This process uses baryon annihilation (which is allowed in the Standard Model, as baryon number minus lepton number, B - L, is conserved), and its inverse, by way of electroweak quantum tunneling caused via the Principle of Least Action by the physical requirement that the Omega Point final cosmological singularity exists. Tipler also proposes that the virgin birth of Jesus by Mary could be possible via Jesus being a special type of XX male who obtained all of his genetic material from Mary (i.e., an instance of parthenogenesis). Tipler concludes that the Star of Bethlehem was either a Type Ic hypernova located in the Andromeda Galaxy, or a Type Ia supernova located in a globular cluster of our own Milky Way Galaxy.

If the Incarnation of Jesus Christ and the miracles attributed to him in the New Testament were necessary in order to lead to the formation of the Omega Point--and if the known laws of physics are correct--then the probability of these events occurring is certain. Furthermore, Tipler proposes tests on particular relics associated with Jesus which, if the relics are genuine, could verify whether in fact said miracles took place via the aforementioned mechanisms.


Physicist Prof. Lawrence M. Krauss starts his presentation at 49:36 min:sec. 52:54 min:sec ff.: Krauss begins by engaging in the logical fallacy of bare assertion. Krauss asserts that (1) the Standard Model of particle physics isn't complete; (2) we don't have a consistent theory of quantum gravity; (3) the universe doesn't have to collapse; (4) we don't understand the nature of dark energy; and (5) we don't know why there is more matter than antimatter in the universe.

In answer to Krauss: (1) The Standard Model describes all forces in nature except for gravity. And gravity is described by General Relativity. (2) The problem has been to make General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics consistent with each other, which is done with the Omega Point/Feynman-DeWitt-Weinberg quantum gravity theory. (3) The universe must collapse in finite proper time or otherwise unitarity will be violated (see p. 925 [cf. pp. 904-905] of F. J. Tipler, "The structure of the world from pure numbers", Reports on Progress in Physics, Vol. 68, No. 4 [Apr. 2005], pp. 897-964). (4) The dark energy is the positive cosmological constant. As required by the Standard Model of particle physics, the net baryon number was created in the early universe by baryogenesis via electroweak quantum tunneling. This necessarily forces the Higgs field to be in a vacuum state that is not its absolute vacuum, which is the cause of the observed cosmological constant. (5) The universe's initial SU(2)_L field of the Standard Model--which is required by quantum field theory--gives the observed excess of matter over antimatter. See op. cit. for details on the foregoing matters.

Prof. Krauss attempts to rebut Prof. Tipler's proposed mechanism for the miracles of Jesus Christ by relating how statistically improbable such events are, yet this doesn't actually address Tipler's arguments since Tipler's point is that such seemingly improbable events would be forced to occur by the known laws of physics via the Principle of Least Action if said events are required in order for the universe to evolve into the Omega Point final singularity. Krauss himself in his review of Tipler's book The Physics of Christianity admits that this mechanism which Tipler proposes for Jesus Christ's miracles is physically sound if said miracles were necessary in order to lead to the formation of the Omega Point and if the Omega Point is required in order for existence to exist (see Lawrence Krauss, "More dangerous than nonsense", New Scientist, Vol. 194, No. 2603 [May 12, 2007], p. 53).

1:00:52 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss provides a quote from Gerardus 't Hooft, but as with Krauss's discussion of probabilities, 't Hooft's remarks are irrelevant to Tipler's actual argument, since 't Hooft is assuming boundary conditions on the universe which are inconsistent with quantum field theory rather than the Omega Point/Feynman-DeWitt-Weinberg quantum gravity/Standard Model TOE boundary conditions which makes all the laws of physics mutually mathematically consistent with each other.

1:02:01 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss provides a quote from Steven Weinberg, of which again is irrelevant to Tipler's actual argument, since as with 't Hooft, Weinberg is assuming inconsistent boundary conditions.

Krauss, 't Hooft, and Weinberg are all particle physicists. Whereas Tipler is not only an expert in quantum field theory (i.e., Quantum Mechanics combined with special-relativistic particle physics) but also an expert in Global General Relativity and computer theory. Furthermore, neither Krauss, 't Hooft, nor Weinberg display any awareness of Tipler's 2005 Reports on Progress in Physics paper which presents the technical details of the Omega Point TOE.

1:03:15 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss claims that all the evidence in nature indicates that the universe will expand forever. Ironically, Krauss has actually published a paper that greatly helped to strengthen Tipler's Omega Point cosmology. Some have suggested that the current acceleration of the universe's expansion due to the positive cosmological constant would appear to obviate the Omega Point. However, Profs. Krauss and Turner point out that "there is no set of cosmological observations we can perform that will unambiguously allow us to determine what the ultimate destiny of the Universe will be." (See Lawrence M. Krauss and Michael S. Turner, "Geometry and Destiny", General Relativity and Gravitation, Vol. 31, No. 10 [Oct. 1999], pp. 1453-1459.) While cosmological observations cannot tell us what the ultimate fate of the universe will be, the known laws of physics themselves can, as the universe is forced to end in finite proper time in order for unitarity to remain unviolated (again, see p. 925 [cf. pp. 904–905] of id., "The structure of the world from pure numbers", op. cit.).


1:23:06 h:min:sec ff.: Tipler starts his response to Krauss, wherein Tipler addresses Krauss's claims.


1:29:22 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss starts his second response to Tipler.

1:30:34 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss claims that the laws of physics prevent sapient life from harnessing baryon annihilation. However, the laws of physics allow baryon annihilation using electroweak quantum tunneling via quantum coherence. As Tipler writes, "Atoms have energy levels that differ by a few electron volts. Quantum coherence among a trillion atoms would allow the atoms to concentrate the energy differences of the levels on a single atom, and this would be 10 TeV, the amount of energy needed for the baryon-annihilation process to go forward." (See Frank J. Tipler, The Physics of Christianity [New York: Doubleday, 2007], p. 73.)

1:31:09 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss talks about "the energy of empty space", by which he means the dark energy. See my above response to Krauss's previous comments on the dark energy.


1:32:29 h:min:sec ff.: Tipler and Krauss take questions from the audience.

1:35:57 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss claims that we don't understand physics well enough to know whether unitarity is violated if an astrophysical black hole were to evaporate.

Regarding proposed solutions to the black hole information issue, all except for Tipler's Omega Point cosmology share the common feature of using proposed new laws of physics that have never been experimentally confirmed--and indeed which violate the known laws of physics--such as with Prof. Stephen Hawking's paper on the black hole information issue which is dependent on the conjectured String Theory-based anti-de Sitter space/conformal field theory correspondence (AdS/CFT correspondence). (See S. W. Hawking, "Information loss in black holes", Physical Review D, Vol. 72, No. 8 [Oct. 15, 2005], Art. No. 084013, 4 pp.) Hence, the end of the universe in finite proper time via collapse before a black hole completely evaporates is required if unitarity is to remain unviolated, i.e., if General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics--which are what the proofs of Hawking radiation derive from--are true statements of how the world works.

1:42:13 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss invokes the Christ myth theory, including incorrectly claiming that nearly every religion has had virgin births.

Regarding the Christ myth theory, virtually all the items which the Christ myth theorists claim as facts which show the parallels of Christianity with earlier pagan religions are completely fabricated modern claims that can't be found in the historical record. For an excellent discussion on this, see the following video:

"Did Jesus Exist? Shattering the Christ Myth (JP Holding)", rfvidz, Mar. 30, 2012. " onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; , http://bethelchristianfellowship.info/f ... opyCat.m4v" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The above video is an interview of James Patrick Holding (editor of Shattering the Christ Myth: Did Jesus Not Exist? [Maitland, Fla.: Xulon Press, 2008] http://amazon.com/dp/1606472712" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ) by Dr. Craig Johnson on the topic of the Christ myth theory. See also the below resources regarding the Christ myth theory on J. P. Holding's website:

"Were Bible stories and characters stolen from pagan myths?", Tekton Education and Apologetics Ministry. http://www.tektonics.org/copycathub.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

"Did Jesus exist?", op. cit. http://www.tektonics.org/jesusexisthub.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

1:47:06 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss agrees that the only hope for eternal life is in a collapsing universe.

1:48:06 h:min:sec ff.: An audience member asks Tipler about Matthew 10:23, Mark 9:1 and John 5:25 as being examples of where Jesus Christ incorrectly thought that the End Time was imminent, i.e., within Jesus's own generation.

Matthew 10:23, New King James Version (NKJV) states, "When they persecute you in this city, flee to another. For assuredly, I say to you, you will not have gone through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes." And indeed they did not go through all the cities of Israel before they died, and hence before Christ's Second Coming.

Mark 9:1, NKJV (cf. Matthew 16:28; Luke 9:27) states, "And He said to them, 'Assuredly, I say to you that there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God present with power.'" And then the very next passages concern Christ's Transfiguration, whereby Heaven was also shown.

John 5:25, NKJV states, "Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live." But the next passages, John 5:26-29, go on to state, "For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man. Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice and come forth--those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation." These passages relate to Jesus's statement that "I am the resurrection and the life." (John 11:25, NKJV. Cf. John 8:12 [cf. 1 John 1:5]; 14:6.) In other words, those raised from death are already existing within Jesus Christ in His transcendent Second Person aspect, since the Father and the Son are One (see Isaiah 9:6; John 10:30; 14:6-13). So when Jesus said this, it was a different way of saying that the Resurrection and the Life stood there before them right then in His human aspect.

So in each of these scripture passages which this audience member gave as examples of Christ getting some things wrong are both examples of Him being correct.

Sometimes people also give Matthew 24:32-35 as being an example of Christ making an incorrect prophecy. However, "this generation" referred to in Matthew 24:34 concerns the generation which witnesses the signs of the End Time which Jesus discusses.

2:02:13 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss talks about Newtonian mechanics being replaced by General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics, and hence that we shouldn't be surprised that the current known laws of physics might also be replaced. However, as Tipler pointed out in his presentation, the fundamental physics of today are simply more specific subsets of Newtonian mechanics, i.e., Newtonian mechanics with specific constrains put on it in order to make it consistent with observations and to make its resulting subsets mutually mathematically consistent with each other. Hence, we have never left the realm of Newton's physics. And all the forces in physics are now described and made mutually consistent with the Omega Point/Feynman-DeWitt-Weinberg quantum gravity/Standard Model TOE. (See above for more on that.) 2:03:26 h:min:sec ff.: Krauss states that the Standard Model of particle physics produces nonsense answers when pushed to high enough energies, as does Quantum Electrodynamics (QED). However, as Tipler previously pointed out in his presentation, imposing unitarity avoids the spacetime infinities of quantum field theory, since if there were not a cut-off to the energies of quantum field theory then miniature black holes would be created and quickly evaporate, thereby violating unitarity. Krauss also gives the infinities of quantum field theory as a reason for thinking that new forms of physics will be required at higher energy scales. However, this mechanism to the energy cut-off also allows the energies to gradually scale to infinity during the collapse phase of the universe (the energies only become actually infinite at the cosmological singularity), which means that there is no need for new physics at higher energy scales.

-----

Since the Omega Point/Feynman-DeWitt-Weinberg quantum gravity/Standard Model Theory of Everything (TOE) is mathematically required by the known laws of physics, of which said physical laws have been confirmed by every experiment to date, the only way Krauss could have actually argued against Tipler is to argue that the known laws of physics might be wrong. But because those physical laws have been confirmed by every experiment to date, there exists no rational reason to think that they are wrong. Hence, Krauss's irrelevant arguments (or bare assertions, as Krauss also engaged in) against Tipler were unavoidable, since Krauss set himself a logically-impossible task.

For details on the Omega Point TOE, see the following paper by Prof. Tipler:

* F. J. Tipler, "The structure of the world from pure numbers", Reports on Progress in Physics, Vol. 68, No. 4 (Apr. 2005), pp. 897-964, doi:10.1088/0034-4885/68/4/R04, bibcode: 2005RPPh...68..897T. http://www.math.tulane.edu/~tipler/theo ... ything.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Also released as Frank J. Tipler, "Feynman-Weinberg Quantum Gravity and the Extended Standard Model as a Theory of Everything", arXiv:0704.3276, Apr. 24, 2007. http://arxiv.org/abs/0704.3276" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The following is the first article on the Omega Point TOE:

* Frank J. Tipler, "Genesis: How the Universe Began According to Standard Model Particle Physics", arXiv:astro-ph/0111520, Nov. 28, 2001. http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0111520" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; For images that go with the article, see "Frank J. Tipler, Diagrams", Theophysics: God Is the Ultimate Physicist. http://theophysics.ifastnet.com/tipler-diagrams.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

For the details regarding the point Prof. Tipler made in his presentation about how modern physics (i.e., General Relativity, Quantum Mechanics, and the Standard Model of particle physics) are simply special cases of classical mechanics (i.e., Newtonian mechanics, particularly in its most powerful formulation of the Hamilton-Jacobi Equation), see the following articles:

* Frank J. Tipler, "The Obama-Tribe 'Curvature of Constitutional Space' Paper is Crackpot Physics", Social Science Research Network (SSRN), Oct. 26, 2008, 45 pp., doi:10.2139/ssrn.1271310. http://ssrn.com/abstract=1271310" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

* Maurice J. Dupré and Frank J. Tipler, "General Relativity as an Æther Theory", International Journal of Modern Physics D, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Feb. 2012), Art. No. 1250011, 16 pp., doi:10.1142/S0218271812500113, bibcode: 2012IJMPD..2150011D. http://worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1 ... 1812500113" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Also at arXiv:1007.4572, July 26, 2010. http://arxiv.org/abs/1007.4572" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

* Frank J. Tipler, "Hamilton-Jacobi Many-Worlds Theory and the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle", arXiv:1007.4566, July 26, 2010. http://arxiv.org/abs/1007.4566" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;