Transcription
It feels like everyone has their pet Theory of Everything these days, so why should you take my preferred Theory of Everything seriously? Well, give me five minutes, and I'll give you five reasons why I find Wolfram physics more compelling than anything else that's happened in physics in my lifetime, and maybe you all want to take it seriously too.
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Reason one: The biggest breakthroughs in physics don't tweak the old theories, they blow away the old paradigm. Wolfram physics fundamentally shifts the way we think about the universe. It doesn't tweak the old equations, Einstein's equations in general relativity, Schrödinger's equation in quantum mechanics. It replaces these mathematics operating on continuous fields with computation operating on a discrete hypergraph. This is a true paradigm shift.
Reason two: It's easy enough to come up with a new paradigm, like, you know, the universe is a hypergraph. The question is, does the new paradigm work? Is the hypergraph a true model of reality? Well, it kind of passes the sniff test. That hypergraph kind of looks like space, and the evolution of the hypergraph kind of looks like time. And it passes the special relativity test. You can derive special relativity from the hypergraph. And it passes the general relativity test. You can derive general relativity from the hypergraph. And it passes the quantum mechanics test. You can derive aspects of quantum mechanics from the hypergraph. Wolfram physics isn't a tangle of mathematics that has been tortured to fit our observations. It's a clean model which, so far, has passed every test as a model of reality.
Reason three: A good theory doesn't complicate the laws of physics. A good theory simplifies the laws of physics. Until now, we've assumed the existence of space and time. In Wolfram physics, we don't need to make these assumptions. Space emerges from the hypergraph. Time emerges from the evolution of the hypergraph. Until now, we've assumed the existence of matter and particles. Again, in Wolfram physics, we don't need to make these assumptions. Matter shows up as tangling of the hypergraph. Particles may show up as tiny black holes in the hypergraph. So many phenomena we've previously taken as given emerge from the hypergraph.
Reason four: A good theory doesn't give us a single insight into the nature of the universe. A good theory gives us *any* insights. Wolfram physics keeps on giving aha after aha after aha. If the hypergraph is space and matter is tangling of the hypergraph, then, well, of course tangling of the hypergraph changes the shortest path through the hypergraph. So, of course, matter changes the shortest path through space. So, of course, the sun changes the path of the Earth to its elliptical orbit. Aha! If particles are tiny black holes in the hypergraph, then, well, of course we can see effects of an electron but not what's going on inside an electron, just as we can see effects of a black hole but not what's going on inside a black hole. Aha! If quantum mechanics emerges from the causal graph in the same way as general relativity emerges from the hypergraph, then, well, quantum mechanics and general relativity aren't just compatible at the level of the hypergraph that underlies them both. They're actually the same theory. Aha! Wolfram physics isn't a shallow, single-insight theory. Wolfram physics runs deep.
And reason five: The biggest breakthroughs in physics don't disprove the old theories. They encompass the old theories. They explain the old theories. They tell us why we were right to think what we thought before. If this new computational paradigm prevails, we won't think it strange that we once held to the old mathematical paradigm. We won't blame ourselves for believing in the equations of general relativity and quantum mechanics, because these equations can be derived from the hypergraph. We won't blame ourselves for not seeing the discreteness of space and time, because space and time are discrete at such a small scale that they look continuous at a large scale. We won't blame ourselves for thinking of matter as particles in space, because we didn't have the conceptual framework to imagine that they might be tangles of space. We're right to think what we think now. It's just that if Wolfram physics proves to be what it promises to be, we'll finally know why we were right all along. Nothing else is like this. No other framework in physics I've come across in my lifetime has come close to making such fundamental progress in our understanding of the universe. So, do yourself a favor. Listen to my five reasons. Take Wolfram physics seriously. The best way to learn more about it is subscribe to The Last Theory. It's time to take a closer look at Wolfram physics.
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