Hawking's Last Paper Helps Solve The Biggest Physics Problem?
The Biggest Problem In Modern Physics?
One of the biggest problems in modern physics is the problem of finding a “Theory Of Everything”. The idea of it is to provide a theory which can fully explain and link all aspects of the universe. At the moment we have general relativity which focuses on gravity for understanding the universe on large scales (stars, galaxies etc…) and quantum field theory which focuses on the universe in terms of sub-atomic particles, atoms and molecules etc...
Physicists have confirmed with experiments that the two theories are mutually incompatible i.e. they both can't be right. Since the scales the theories work on are so different however, most situations only require one theory to be correct.
This means the only times the theories are incompatible are in regions of small-scale and high mass, e.g, in a black hole or in the early stages of the universe (just after the Big Bang)
So, to resolve the conflict a theory which unifies the four fundamental forces (gravity, electromagnetic, weak and strong) is needed.
30 years ago, Stephen Hawking said that a "Theory Of Everything" would have a 50% chance of completion by 2000. We still do not have one but the one he thought the most convincing of them was M-Theory. This is a theory which manages to unify 5 versions of string theory.
String theory is pretty much a theory which says instead of describing the universe as made from tiny particles, we can describe it in terms of tiny strings. There are 12 fundamental particles which everything is made of. String theory says that they are all made of the same object (string) except they are just the string but vibrating in a different way. So, what we see as an electron or a quark is actually the string oscillating in a different way.
So, this theory resolves the major issue in physics and a consequence of it is that our universe is simply one universe among many in a multiverse where there are infinite parallel universes.
So, to resolve the conflict a theory which unifies the four fundamental forces (gravity, electromagnetic, weak and strong) is needed.
M-Theory
30 years ago, Stephen Hawking said that a "Theory Of Everything" would have a 50% chance of completion by 2000. We still do not have one but the one he thought the most convincing of them was M-Theory. This is a theory which manages to unify 5 versions of string theory.
String theory is pretty much a theory which says instead of describing the universe as made from tiny particles, we can describe it in terms of tiny strings. There are 12 fundamental particles which everything is made of. String theory says that they are all made of the same object (string) except they are just the string but vibrating in a different way. So, what we see as an electron or a quark is actually the string oscillating in a different way.
So, this theory resolves the major issue in physics and a consequence of it is that our universe is simply one universe among many in a multiverse where there are infinite parallel universes.
Unfortunately, the theory has no evidence to support it and there are still some issues with how to go about describing a landscape of many possible universes.
By 2010 Hawking started to think there may not be a final theory. It’s nice to think that there is one theory uniting physics but some believe it may not exist or is impossible to discover. Maybe the limits to our measurements means we can’t confirm a theory of everything, maybe it does not exist all together or maybe it’s just impossible for us to construct one (Gödel's incompleteness theorem which is what Hawking began to believe).
There may be hope however. Stephen Hawking produced a paper 2 weeks before he died which may be able to help us find the answer. In the paper he theorized that scientists could find alternate universes using probes on space ships. If this was to ever happen and we still had not found a “Theory Of Everything"; this could be very useful in understanding our universe and finding the answer to uniting Physics.
By 2010 Hawking started to think there may not be a final theory. It’s nice to think that there is one theory uniting physics but some believe it may not exist or is impossible to discover. Maybe the limits to our measurements means we can’t confirm a theory of everything, maybe it does not exist all together or maybe it’s just impossible for us to construct one (Gödel's incompleteness theorem which is what Hawking began to believe).
There may be hope however. Stephen Hawking produced a paper 2 weeks before he died which may be able to help us find the answer. In the paper he theorized that scientists could find alternate universes using probes on space ships. If this was to ever happen and we still had not found a “Theory Of Everything"; this could be very useful in understanding our universe and finding the answer to uniting Physics.
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