A Brief History of Time (According to 2 Peter)

tommy@signandshadow.com (Tommy Keene) — Wed, 24 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Physics investigates, among other things, what we might call “the laws of the universe,” and I’m all in. I love all the books and videos targeting the amateur physicist (some favorites include: Minute Physics, Sci Show (not just physics), PBS Space Time, Kurzgesagt, and Sixty Symbols). And yet, one of the things that language like “the laws of physics” implies is a kind of absolute materialist detachment. The laws of the universe are what they are because they are. This is actually one of the big unanswered problems in physics: how did the laws of the universe get to be what they are? Does Planck’s constant equal 6.62607015×10−34 J⋅Hz−1 because it has to be that number, or are there other values that may exist in other possible universes, or did some cosmic being turn a dial somewhere to set it at that number?

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A Brief History of Time (According to 2 Peter)