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Space Science

Escape from the Universe 630

rleyton writes "Prospect Magazine is carrying an excellent article "Escape from the Universe": The universe is destined to end. Before it does, could an advanced civilisation escape via a "wormhole" into a parallel universe? The idea seems like science fiction, but it is consistent with the laws of physics and biology. Here's how to do it."
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Escape from the Universe

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  • by FalconZero ( 607567 ) * <FalconZero@Gmail. c o m> on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:19PM (#11425116)
    ...have obviously never seen 'Sliders' .... otherwise they'd know better.
    • > ..have obviously never seen 'Sliders' .... otherwise they'd know better.

      listen - there's a hell of a white castle next door; let's go.
      - e.e. cummings

    • First or second season, original timer? No chance.

      Third season? Who the hell cares, isn't there a movie homage we can do? (Alt: depends on the whims of a brain-sucking colonel...)

      Fourth or fifth season? Maybe, but you're not guaranteed to be the same person on the other end of the wormhole.
  • neat but.... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by zxnos ( 813588 )
    ... wouldnt a parallel universe be frozen too?
    • Re:neat but.... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by roseblood ( 631824 )
      The idea behind paralell universes are that they are smilar to our own, but slightly diffrent, say, way back when Pangea was the place to be a meteor landed and cracked the mega continent, and in certain paralell universe the metor hit, but didn't crack the continent due to some serious english being placed on the rock when it fell (or whatever bullshit thing you can think of.) Fastforward 100million years and the dinosar killing rock hits ocean instead of land, so the big die-off isn't so big. Fastforward
  • by meckardt ( 113120 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:20PM (#11425121) Homepage
    With my luck, the parallel universe that I escaped into would be even closer to ending than this one...
  • Stephen Baxter (Score:3, Informative)

    by angrist ( 787928 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:20PM (#11425128)
    Haven't even loaded TFA yet, but the idea sounds VERY similar to the premise of Stephen Baxter's book "Ring"......

    an excellent read if you get the chance.
  • End of Universe? (Score:2, Informative)

    by WaZiX ( 766733 )
    Now tht could solve the Social Security problem.
  • by BerntB ( 584621 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:22PM (#11425147)
    Couldn't we wait a few billions of years before we start consider this question seriously?
    • Couldn't we wait a few billions of years before we start consider this question seriously?
      Given the way we treat each other, our planet (i.e. an industrial dump), and a lack of a clear vision to move humans into space I think a more pressing problem is limited habitability of Earth -- thousand years, tops?
      • "I think a more pressing problem is limited habitability of Earth -- thousand years, tops?

        I reckon you're way off the mark.

        With the tools we have at the moment and the way we're handling them, I reckon we've got 50-odd years at the outside...assuming there isn't some catastrophic event between now and then, that is.

        :)
    • Yea, I think it would be a lot more productive to try to figure out how to stop blowing up the relatively small patch of the universe which we are currently limited to. That seems to be the more frugal endeavor being it likely to affect us within our actual current lifetimes.
    • Probably a better question would be "Aren't we a few billions of years late in knowing the answer?"

      Not that I believe in such things, but if you're going sci-fi, *go* sci-fi.
    • by Anonymous Coward
      Typical spineless shortsighted politician once again dumping our serious problems into the laps of our greatE+9(grandchildren)
    • But at the rate we're going we'll be extinct in a century or so. We have to work on this problem now, while we're still around!
  • by agraupe ( 769778 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:22PM (#11425151) Journal
    This was one of my biggest concerns! I mean, the universe could end tomorrow, and we'd be completely unprepared! I am so incredibly important that I must escape via a wormhole before the universe ends, so I may help... other such people... uh... get back to me.
  • antimatter (Score:3, Interesting)

    by gollum123 ( 810489 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:23PM (#11425169)
    what if the parallel universe you pop out through the wormhole into is made completely of antimatter.
  • I think Prospect Magazine's web server just escaped into another universe.
    • by FalconZero ( 607567 ) * <FalconZero@Gmail. c o m> on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:34PM (#11425327)
      Article Text from :
      http://prospectmagazine.co.uk/article_details.php? id=6701

      Lifted at :
      22:00 20/01/05

      The universe is out of control, in a runaway acceleration. Eventually all intelligent life will face the final doom--the big freeze. An advanced civilisation must embark on the ultimate journey: fleeing to a parallel universe.


      In Norse mythology, Ragnarok--the fate of the gods--begins when the earth is caught in the vice-like grip of a bone-chilling freeze. The heavens themselves freeze over, as the gods perish in great battles with evil serpents and murderous wolves. Eternal darkness settles over the bleak, frozen land as the sun and moon are both devoured. Odin, the father of all gods, finally falls to his death, and time itself comes to a halt.


      Does this ancient tale foretell our future? Ever since the work of Edwin Hubble in the 1920s, scientists have known that the universe is expanding, but most have believed that the expansion was slowing as the universe aged. In 1998, astronomers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the Australian National University calculated the expansion rate by studying dozens of powerful supernova explosions within distant galaxies, which can light up the entire universe. They could not believe their own data. Some unknown force was pushing the galaxies apart, causing the expansion of the universe to accelerate. Brian Schmidt, one of the group leaders, said, "I was still shaking my head, but we had checked everything... I was very reluctant to tell people, because I truly thought that we were going to get massacred."


      Physicists went scrambling back to their blackboards and realised that some "dark energy" of unknown origin, akin to Einstein's "cosmological constant," was acting as an anti-gravity force. Apparently, empty space itself contains enough repulsive dark energy to blow the universe apart. The more the universe expands, the more dark energy there is to make it expand even faster, leading to an exponential runaway mode.


      In 2003, this astonishing result was confirmed by the WMAP (Wilkinson microwave anisotropy probe) satellite. Orbiting at a million miles from earth, this satellite contains two telescopes capable of detecting the faint microwave radiation which bathes the universe. It is so sensitive that it is able to photograph in exquisite detail the afterglow of the microwave radiation left over from the big bang, which is still circulating the universe. The WMAP satellite, in effect, gave us "baby pictures" of the universe when it was a mere 380,000 years old.


      The WMAP satellite settled the long-standing question of the age of the universe: it is officially 13.7bn years old (to within 1 per cent accuracy). But more remarkably, the data showed that dark energy is not a fluke, but makes up 73 per cent of the matter and energy of the entire universe. To deepen the mystery, the data showed that 23 per cent of the universe consists of "dark matter," a bizarre form of matter which is invisible but still has weight. Hydrogen and helium make up 4 per cent, while the higher elements, you and I included, make up just 0.03 per cent. Dark energy and most of dark matter do not consist of atoms, which means that, contrary to what the ancient Greeks believed and what is taught in every chemistry course, most of the universe is not made of atoms at all.


      As the universe expands, its energy content is diluted and temperatures eventually plunge to near absolute zero, where even atoms stop moving. One of the iron laws of physics is the second law of thermodynamics, which states that in the end everything runs down, that the total "entropy" (disorder or chaos) in the universe always increases. This means that iron rusts, our bodies age and crumble, empires fall, stars exhaust their nuclear fuel, and the universe itself will run down, as temperatures drop uniformly to near zero.


      Charles Darwin was referring to this law when he wrote: "Beli
      • Why am I not surprised that Norse mythology foretells a final, freezing doom for god and man alike? This is from the society that drinks 11% alcohol beer during their eight-month winters.

        Oh, and they produce a wildly disproportionate number of the world's death metal bands.

  • We can't get our act together on dealing with things that we know are going to happen within out lifetimes but we're supposed to worry about escaping the heat death of the universe?

    --MarkusQ

  • by pchan- ( 118053 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:24PM (#11425179) Journal
    The universe is destined to end. Before it does, could an advanced civilisation escape via a "wormhole" into a parallel universe?

    No. Anything that is reacheable from our universe is, by definition, part of the universe. The concept of "escape" has no meaning in this context.
    • Anything that is reacheable from our universe is, by definition, part of the universe. The concept of "escape" has no meaning in this context.

      OK, then redefine 'universe'. After all, an atom can't be split; that's what the word 'atom' means... Just come up with a new word for the larger structure, and don't worry too much about Greek derivations.

    • by Soko ( 17987 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:36PM (#11425343) Homepage
      No. Anything that is reacheable from our universe is, by definition, part of the universe.

      Well, the webserver is, at this exact point in time in this universe, unreachable. If your definition is assumed to be correct, that server is not part of this universe.

      That would mean that the Slashdot Effect can blow a server to an alternate universe (or at least give it an alternate quantum state).

      Soko
    • Anything that is reacheable from our universe is, by definition, part of the universe. The concept of "escape" has no meaning in this context.

      Well, we're playing with definitions here. By your definition of "universe," it's still possible to conceive that we could escape from our current "region" of the universe - which is dying - through a wormhole, to another "region" that is not so close to dying.

      It just presupposes that maybe the "universe" is much bigger than we currently think, and there's a way

    • by Infonaut ( 96956 ) <infonaut@gmail.com> on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:47PM (#11425515) Homepage Journal
      Anything that is reacheable from our universe is, by definition, part of the universe.

      As you can see, it's not easy [wikipedia.org] to come to agreement about what the term "our universe" actually means. A term this broad invites all manner of semantic arguments

  • by meringuoid ( 568297 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:26PM (#11425213)
    1: Build a Great Attractor
    2: Suck up thousands of galaxies into a toroidal naked singularity
    3: Avoid any pesky humans throwing relativistic neutron stars around the universe
    4: Hold off neutrino birds at all costs
    5: Escape universe

    Potential hazards: physical constants of new universe may not be what you expected. Beware of ultra-high gravity.

    • 1: Build a Great Attractor 2: Suck up thousands of galaxies into a toroidal naked singularity 3: Avoid any pesky humans throwing relativistic neutron stars around the universe 4: Hold off neutrino birds at all costs 5: Escape universe

      PFFT! *hits the switch on his improbability drive*

    • Wish I had mod points, this one is a very clever reference.
    • Re:How to do it: (Score:3, Informative)

      The least you could do is tell people what story you're referring to.

      Vacuum Diagrams [amazon.com] is a collection of short stories about a race called the Xeelee, and how humanity discovers them, moves to the stars and is nearly destroyed. The stories have an epic scope - several million years - but are quite entertaining. One of the most enjoyable reads I've ever had.

      I'd describe what a 'great attractor' or 'neutrino birds' are, but that would give a way a lot of the story.

  • Ironic (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:26PM (#11425230)
    "Escape from the Universe" commented on by people who haven't figured out how to escape their parent's basements.
    • If only I had mod points. Definitely +1: Funny.
    • by Chris Burke ( 6130 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @07:06PM (#11426324) Homepage
      Many geeks are aware of the fact that their parent's basements will not last forever. While many say this is both far off and inevitable and thus not worth worrying about, a growing number of geek researchers are treating the issue seriously, and turning to advanced physics for a solution.

      Under some theories, there is not just one parent's basement, but in fact many basements. In this "multi-basement" view, it would even be possible to travel from one basement to another.

      The theory states that up the stairs and through the kitchen there are portals that lead to a realm given the mysterious sounding name of "Outside". And indeed, it is mysterious.

      "We know virtually nothing about 'Outside'," said a prominent geek theorist whose name I'm too lazy to make up. "The theory states that one could travel through 'Outside' to any other place in the known basements, but we aren't sure how that is possible. Certainly it would be a place of astounding energy. While still purely theory, one of my colleagues sent me an IM claiming that he actually saw this energy shining through the windows of the kitchen when he went upstairs to get lunch."

      While agreeing with the general theory, several researchers say that Outside provides no hope to the geek facing the destruction of his basement. The incredible energy of Outside, they say, would fry a geek in an instant. One said clearly fabricated claims that some geeks had already travelled Outside and returned was proof that the theory was the realm of crackpots.

      "There are certainly difficulties involved in traveling Outside," said that same geek from before, "but we've found nothing insurmountable as of yet. I've calculated that the energy of Outside waxes and wanes in approximately twelve hour cycles and travel would be possible during the low portion of the cycle. Frankly, I think these theoretical problems will be overcome. I'd be much more concerned about the practical implications of traveling to other basements, such as: if there are no parents in these new basements, who will pay rent and fill the fridge? What if there is no Chinese or pizza delivery? These are the issues engineers will have to face as they travel to new worlds beyond the kitchen."

      While all geeks we spoke with admitted that it is far too early to draw any conclusions, many said that this new field of research should give geeks everywhere hope.
  • In Greg Egan's [netspace.net.au] Diaspora, uploaded post-human intelligences find out that a huge gamma-ray burster is going to go off in the middle of the galaxy, and make plans to migrate to a higher geometry of spacetime. The novel stretches from a few centuries hence all the way to 90000 trillion (IIRC) subjective years in the future, after the protagonists have automated the process of migrating to other spacetime geometries, and only have the consciousness awakened every 1000th translation or so...

    Not Egan's best (th

  • duh... (Score:3, Funny)

    by gralem ( 45862 ) * on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:28PM (#11425243)
    The idea seems like science fiction, but it is consistent with the laws of physics and biology. Here's how to do it.

    The short answer: Find worm hole. Jump into said wormhole. Escape universe. I mean, this is pretty basic stuff here.

    ---gralem
  • I think prospect magazine just escaped into a parallell internet..
  • by henrik ( 98 )
    ... people are starving. Great people spend time thinking of current problems.
    • OOOO! OOOOh! I know this one!!!

      Because there is no money in it!

      WooHoo! Where do collect my prize money?
    • Oh yeah. Excellent attitude.

      I mean, why bother sending all those probes to learn about the Universe when we all could be busy farming to produce more food. Bring down those buildings and rear more cattle so that can can feed everyone.

      Get over it. Just because there is a section of underprivileged population does not mean you do not work on other things. Civilization is a cumulative point of achievement of everything that's happened before it - unless you can provide for that, you're not going to progress.
  • by coyote-san ( 38515 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:30PM (#11425279)
    This is the third universe and things are definitely going downhill. Why, back in the day you never had stars spew their guts all over space and call it a "supernova." If they did they had the courtesy to clean up after themselves.

    And don't get me started on those noisy pulsars or horrid black holes! I can't think of anything that sucks as much as black holes!
    • Why, back in the day you never had stars spew their guts all over space and call it a "supernova." If they did they had the courtesy to clean up after themselves.

      Life was much better in the quark-gluon era. It was warm back then, with none of these howling great voids of nothing. I'm just hanging around watching Eta Carinae in the hope that it'll explode and I can catch some nice warm neutrinos to keep out the bitter cold...

      Whoever decided to press the button on the Inflation Device really needs kicking

    • What's your trouble, mate? Most of those who have a closer look at them black holes reckon they're quite attractive. You must be one of them foreigners who don't know how to really see our local beauties.
  • by syousef ( 465911 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:33PM (#11425314) Journal
    What's the point in theorizing about escaping the Universe when it expires, when we haven't even set up a permanent base outside Earth orbit??? Might be fun to think about but that's about it.

    There will be cataclysms on Earth, and in our solar system long before, which we need to avoid. Hell we don't even have a decent early warning system for large meteors, let alone a workable action plan against being wiped out by one.

    This isn't like trying to fly before you can walk. This is more like sperm in a testicle trying to plan for when it becomes an Olympic athelete!
  • ..Last Post?
  • by SeaDour ( 704727 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:34PM (#11425329) Homepage
    If there are an infintie number of parallel universes, why aren't there an infinite number of wormholes opening all over the place in our universe?
    • by aztektum ( 170569 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:45PM (#11425483)
      Because they have yet to RTFA
    • Imagine a circle infinitely large.

      Now cut it in half, cut one of its halfs in half, and cut one of those quarters in half.

      How big are the smallest two sections you have? Infinitly big. Or, to be precise, 1/8 infinity.

      Similar math is what keeps wormholes from happening all over the place. With infinite space then, yes, we would have an infinite number of wormholes. But their ratio wouldn't necessarily change from the effect if we had, oh, a finite space.

    • If there are an infintie number of parallel universes, why aren't there an infinite number of wormholes opening all over the place in our universe?

      There just might be.. Oh, not an infinite number, but one of those really, really big numbers, followed by lots and lots of zeros.

      Oh, and the wormholes are small. Really small. Mind-bogglingly small. About a Planck length. And they don't go very far. Probably not to another universe.

    • Maybe our own universe is already unatractive to the infinite numbers of parallel-universe refugee. They do after all have another infinite number of better destinations to choose.
    • An interesting observation..

      Keep in mind that there are there are different "sizes" of infinity ("proof" below). If you accept this, you can accept that having an infinite number of universes and an infinite number of universe bridging wormholes, does not imply an infinite number of wormholes in each universe.

      Notes

      1) Using a digitalization argument you can show that the number of whole numbers is "countably infinite" while the number of real numbers (fractional numbers) is "uncountably infinite". And t
    • sigh.. I see this again and again.

      Ok let's say you have 1 object, and there's a 100% chance it's an object that's going to open up a wormhole into your universe. Now make it 2 and 50% (independent events). Now make it 4 and 25%, now make it a billion with a chance of 1/billion. Now make it an infinite number of objects, each with an infinitesimal chance of opening up a wormhole in your universe. What does this number approach? (Hint: Not infinity)
  • I'll wait (Score:4, Funny)

    by TrippTDF ( 513419 ) <hiland@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:34PM (#11425331)
    The idea seems like science fiction, but it is consistent with the laws of physics and biology. Here's how to do it."

    I'll wait until "Escaping your Universe for Dummies" comes out... that's always easy to read.
  • I consider the term Parallel Universe to be rather misleading, as it may be possible that there are other universes out there, but are just so far away from our own as to be undetectable.

    Also, who's to say that the laws of Physics to which we are accustomed are universal (no pun intendeded)? I've met theorists who suspect that our laws of Physics are a by-product of the formation of our own universe, and the reason we don't see too many others is that they often form with a set of physical rules that are
  • ... webmasters would have devised a way to avoid being slashdotted?!

  • As long as the worm's hole doesn't have any Klingons around Uranus I'm cool with it.
  • by PornMaster ( 749461 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:39PM (#11425402) Homepage
    When the universe explodes for my pleasure, I want to be downing Pan-Galactic Gargle Blasters.
  • ... a week or so before the jump so that I can grow the goatee.

  • The current preponderance of evidence shows that the Universe is not going to end, but rather to continue expanding (possibly at an accelerating rate). In this scenario, the Universe will go on forever, it's just that eventually it will be untenable for life (or much else) to exist.
  • ...it's possible to escape to a parallel universe. But it's the Cowboy Universe, so if that's not your thing, maybe you'd rather just stay and die.

  • "Mental Masturbation", nothing more. What else can you possibly get from this? An interesting read but nothing I can really wrap my brain around in there if you know what I mean.
  • Earlier Story (Score:2, Informative)

    by dwbassett42 ( 752317 )
    The Author, Michio Kaku, also had essentially the exact same article in the December issue of Discover. The article is right here [discover.com]. Very interesting read, but the engineer in me makes me laugh at the sheer impracticality if the possible methods.

    www.owlsden.com/moroha [owlsden.com]
  • Didn't Stephen Hawking say recently that there is no possibility of using black holes to travel to other universes [physicsweb.org]?

    Quote:

    Hawking presented his solution to the 17th International Conference on General Relativity and Gravitation in Dublin. ...
    Hawking also dismisses his previous suggestion that the information might have leaked into a different "Baby" universe. "The information remains firmly in our universe," he told the conference. "I am sorry to disappoint science fiction fans, but if information is preserved, there is no possibility of using black holes to travel to other universes. If you jump into a black hole, your mass energy will be returned to our universe, but in a mangled form which contains the information about what you were like, but in an unrecognisable state.
    (Emphasis mine)
    • You know that a black hole and a worm hole are two different suggestions of which is a possible shape of space according to general relativity right? If you really want to say that worm holes are just silly, all you need to do is look at a single component of a worm hole that is necessary for it to function: exotic matter. There is no reason to believe that exotic matter exists. There has been no observed phenomona which suggests that exotic matter could exist. There's a lot of reason to believe that ne
    • Didn't Stephen Hawking say recently that there is no possibility of using black holes to travel to other universes?

      It's true (well, for a given value of "true"), but black holes aren't the same things as wormholes. Wormholes are a quantum concept (in the sense that they're really really small) where you get to travel between different bits of spacetime by taking shortcuts. Did I say they're really really small? We're talking mind-boggling sub-sub-sub-atomic here.

      Black holes are just huge chunks of mass (
    • by TexVex ( 669445 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @06:08PM (#11425740)
      String theory indicates that black holes are not singularities, and their event horizons are fuzzy. They are not holes, but balls of strings compressed to the maximum possible density the universe will allow. In other words, every quantum state inside a black hole is filled. Black holes aren't composed of anything resembling matter or energy we recognize. However, information about what the matter was before becoming part of the black hole remains encoded in the (extradimensional) vibrations of the strings. Slowly, over time, the black hole gives up its strings (and the information they contained) from the fuzzy event horizon, until it evaporates.

      So, one way to look at it is, if you jump into a black hole you'll be transformed into the tiny vibrating strings that make up subatomic particles according to String Theory, then those strings will be flung off in randomly over time in the form of Hawking radiation.

      That would be a cool thing to do with your corpse, much like having your body cremated and your ashes scattered.
  • Laws of Biology ? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by cyberfunk2 ( 656339 )
    "is consistant with the laws of physics and biology."

    What pray tell are the "laws of biology" and how do they have ANYTHING to do with wormholes?
  • What if the other universe is antimatter, and by entering, I blow myself, and a big chunk of both universes up?
  • by WCityMike ( 579094 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:49PM (#11425535)
    Before it does, could an advanced civilisation escape via a "wormhole" into a parallel universe?

    Now why would I want to do that? With my luck, I'd wind up in a universe where we had President George W. Bush, instead of Al Gore beginning his second term.

    Yeesh. What a terrifying concept ...
  • notes? (Score:2, Funny)

    by brit74 ( 831798 )
    I'd take notes, but with my luck there would be very little chance that I'd be able to find them again in 10 billion years when I need them.
  • by Darth_Burrito ( 227272 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:56PM (#11425605)
    I haven't read the article, but (assuming infinite expansion) presumably the issue with the universe ending is with everything approaching entropy. In other words, we lose accessible energy. If we can escape to another universe, who's to say we can't steal some other universe's energy to keep our own universe kicking. It's Mega Maid!!! She's gone from suck to blow! (or vice versa in this case).

    I'm afraid I've grown rather attached to this universe.
  • escapism (Score:3, Informative)

    by Doc Ruby ( 173196 ) on Thursday January 20, 2005 @05:59PM (#11425640) Homepage Journal
    Though the wormhole route is explored most engagingly in Greg Egan's Diaspora [netspace.net.au], I prefer the Total Perspective Vortex [fscked.org] in H2G2 [hhgproject.org].
  • by macdaddy357 ( 582412 ) <macdaddy357@hotmail.com> on Friday January 21, 2005 @12:50AM (#11429007)
    I just read the whole article. Wow man! That's some heavy shit. By the way, would somebody pass the bong?

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