Related papers: Cosmic Modesty
We discuss the evolution of the universe in the context of the second law of thermodynamics from its early stages to the far future. Cosmological observations suggest that most matter and radiation will be absorbed by the cosmological…
When we try to search for extraterrestrial life and intelligence, we have to follow some guidelines. The first step is to clarify what is to be meant by "Life" and "intelligence", i.e. an attempt to define these words. The word "definition"…
The universe appears to be accelerating, but the reason why is a complete mystery. The simplest explanation, a small vacuum energy (cosmological constant), raises three difficult issues: why the vacuum energy is so small, why it is not…
The purpose of the present work is two folded: (1) we propose a new mechanism for the origin of bulk viscosity in cosmological context, and then, (2) we address the thermodynamic implications of viscous cosmology based on the thermodynamics…
The large scale distribution of galaxies in the universe displays a complex pattern of clusters, super-clusters, filaments and voids with sizes limited only by the boundaries of the available samples. A quantitative statistical…
``One could imagine that as a result of enormously extended astronomical experience, the entire universe consists of countless identical copies of our Milky Way, that the infinite space can be partitioned into cubes each containing an…
Our knowledge about the universe has increased tremendously in the last three decades or so --- thanks to the progress in observations --- but our understanding has improved very little. There are several fundamental questions about our…
These lecture notes aim to provide an introduction to dark matter from the perspective of astrophysics/cosmology. We start with a rapid overview of cosmology, including the evolution of the Universe, its thermal history and structure…
We observe the past and present of the universe, but can we predict the far future? Observations suggest that in thousands of billions of years from now most matter and radiation will be absorbed by the cosmological horizon. As it absorbs…
In this essay, I wish to share a novel perspective based on the principle of universalization in arriving at the relativistic and quantum world from the classical world. I also delve on some insightful discussion on going ``beyond''.
Observational cosmology is on the verge of new discoveries that will change the essence of our world-view. The matter concerns origin of initial conditions and physics of dark matter.
We describe how cosmology has converged towards a beautiful model of the Universe: the Big Bang Universe. We praise this model, but show there is a dark side to it. This dark side is usually called ``the cosmological problems'': a set of…
In models where the constants of Nature can take more than one set of values, the cosmological wave function $\psi$ describes an ensemble of universes with different values of the constants. The probability distribution for the constants…
The essay argues that the standard cosmological model is one sided and incomplete. Its recognition of the primacy of radiant energy has no rational justification and empirical verification and, therefore, is arbitrary and subjective. The…
If the parameters defining the physics of our universe departed from their present values, the observed rich structure and complexity would not be supported. This article considers whether similar fine-tuning of parameters applies to…
In his late work (De venatione sapientiae), Cusanus unfolded basic ideas of his brilliant theology. After a long period, this ingenious teaching became clearly recognizable especially in our time. Forward with his face to the back, modern…
Earth-like planets are expected to provide the greatest opportunity for the detection of life beyond the Solar System. However our planet cannot be considered a fair sample, especially if intelligent life exists elsewhere. Just as a…
Infinity, in various guises, has been invoked recently in order to `explain' a number of important questions regarding observable phenomena in science, and in particular in cosmology. Such explanations are by their nature speculative. Here…
We present several philosophical ideas emerging from the studies of complex systems. We make a brief introduction to the basic concepts of complex systems, for then defining "abstraction levels". These are useful for representing…
Prediction in quantum cosmology requires a specification of the universe's quantum dynamics and its quantum state. We expect only a few general features of the universe to be predicted with probabilities near unity conditioned on the…