24 Comments
Nov 2, 2022Liked by Julian Gough

Intriguing, I'm curious where you think this process of evolution started, if you believe it even has one. Is there a primordial universe somewhere or is this just a continuous process?

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Feb 21, 2023Liked by Julian Gough

Thank you for the aside to Ursula K. Le Guin 1986. I appreciated the nod to the gatherer and weavers, without whom, no sac would exist to perpetuate the hunters and thinkers.

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Jul 8, 2022Liked by Julian Gough

Are you familiar with physicist Jeremy England, who argues that life should be seen as inevitable given a constant energy source?

From my perspective, life is merely another way of accelerating the entropy of the universe even faster. Life isn’t some squishy fluke on the edge of an indifferent cosmos; life itself looks like a natural extension and end result of the whole cosmos being alive, coming more and more into ever greater complexity.

The trick seems to be identifying as the whole works, rather than just the inside of one biological organism. The cell wall is actually the _center_ of the cell, which extends to infinity because it requires the whole universe to exist, and vice versa.

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This is fascinating. Let me pose what (I hope) might be a dumb question. Universe A is accidentally born with physical constants that improve the functioning of DNA. How can that improvement affect the the differential reproduction of A versus its peer universes, so that the DNA-favorable constants are passed on to the next generation? Obstacles to this:

(1) A’s offspring are mostly already born by the time A has aged long enough to produce life-bearing planets.

(2) The actions of DNA and the life-forms that it engenders can’t affect the probability of new universe offspring being born or what mutations to physical constants that those offspring have.

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Hi Julian,

I'm curious if you're familiar with Biocentrism? It was written by Robert Lanza and explains that the universe is finely tuned to life as we know it because life and consciousness did not evolve from the universe, but rather consciousness created the universe. He uses quantum mechanics to underpin the main argument in a very elegant way.

Also it's interesting to me that most definitions of entropy continue to describe it as the movement from order to disorder. Even though disorder is increasing, the language here makes it difficult for someone unfamiliar with science to understand this phenomenon (due to how most people imagine disorder). A more accurate definition of entropy is the movement from simple to complex. Even though disorder is also increasing, describing it as complexity not only makes it easier to grasp, but it's also a fuller picture of what's actually happening.

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These ideas seem to be predicated on a sort of multiversal time progression, or at least a chain of causation. I'm not sure this sort of linear narrative isn't just an inherent human bias meant to digest information into comprehensible patterns, but that's an idea that I can't support well yet. In other words, I'm not too confident that every effect needs a cause, or that our understanding of that process of cause and effect is anything more than a convenient simplification.

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Feel free to disregard my comment, because I don't have the attention span at this time of night to thoroughly read the article. But, ideas that sound nice still need solid backing.

Most of the below references came out after your article, but they are what comes to my memory for disputing revolutionary ideas that the mainstream science doesn't take into account.

This I think is talking about the same topic https://youtu.be/rFgpKlcpzNM?si=lBkP61yYx90NPVZp and the channel has more content that goes into the math of the singularity and interpretations of the little data we have.

This goes into the dark matter thing https://youtu.be/PbmJkMhmrVI?si=DvFNc0gpUrogxPh4 . What I recall is that dark matter is an observed phenomenon, like light transmitting energy, but a phenomenon we struggle to explain so we speculate with stuff like this https://youtu.be/sWNTsKX5H5M?si=htjbTeKnqL-3MyZK

Now, the next video will be rude, but it explains why doing the math is important, and that the stories that science communicators put forward to the public is not the most accurate description https://youtu.be/11lPhMSulSU?si=jasQtgRR9GqHFi9E

I am putting this here because I like the attitude of challenging what doesn't make sense, but science is designed to add up. I'd say revolutionizing science is like hacking a system the more times it is done the harder it becomes to do it again.

This is just a vibe https://youtu.be/kya_LXa_y1E?si=Kd6ZdJSFzi6vLs6s

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Very interesting, I am very much appreciating this line of inquiry and this approach to science in general.

One piece of feedback. It wasn't clear to me how the "three nested levels of evolution" map to the hierarchy of sciences. This reader would benefit from it being spelled out a little more.

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BTW, the science fiction novel Manifold: Time, by Stephen Baxter, plays with this idea of evolving universes.

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"He even suggested that the rules of physics might be reset (to random new values) in each new universe."

I have never understood why anyone would consider this idea at all plausible. Why would the rules of physics -- or even just the various physical constants -- change? What's the proposed mechanism? Or is the only motivation for this idea to allow for evolution of universes?

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a very interesting read. As much went over my head as I believe i undeestood. A very intersting read. thanks Julian. steve Law. Wirral. UK.

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I am quite enjoying your Substack. Your project seems monumental. I would suggest that you don't necessarily need LSD to conceive of the universe as an evolving entity. A.N. Whitehead in his __Process and Realty__ articulated the philosophical principles behind such a view. His scientific understanding was grounded in early to mid 20th Century science (no knowledge of black holes and singularities, e.g.), but his use of such concepts as 'organism', 'event', 'creativity', 'process', 'prehension', 'concrescence' to articulate this view lay the groundwork for the work you are doing. Check him out & carry on! Will look for your novels.

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