Parallel Worlds (52 page)

Once the nanobot
had found a new planet, it would create a large factory using the raw materials
already available on the planet to build many replicas of itself and make a
large cloning laboratory. The necessary DNA sequences could be produced in this
laboratory and then injected into cells to begin the process of regenerating
whole organisms and eventually the entire species. These cells in the lab would
then be grown into fully adult beings, with the memory and personality of the
original human placed into the brain.

In some sense,
this process would be similar to injecting our DNA (the total information
content of a type III civilization or beyond) into an "egg cell,"
containing the genetic instructions capable of recreating an embryo on the
other side. The "fertilized egg" would be compact, sturdy, and
mobile, yet would contain the entire body of information necessary to recreate
a type III civilization. A typical human cell contains only 30,000 genes,
arranged on 3 billion DNA base pairs, but this concise piece of information is
sufficient to recreate an entire human being, utilizing resources found
outside the sperm (the nourishment provided by the mother). Similarly, the
"cosmic egg" would consist of the totality of information necessary
to regenerate an advanced civilization; the resources to do this (raw
materials, solvents, metals, and so forth) would be found on the other side. In
this way, an advanced civilization, such as a type III Q, might be able to use
their formidable technology to send enough information (about 10
²⁴
bits of information) across a wormhole sufficient to re-create their
civilization on the other side.

Let me emphasize
that every step I've mentioned in this process is so far beyond today's
capability that it must read like science fiction. But billions of years into
the future, for a type III Q civilization facing extinction, it may be the only
possible path to salvation. Certainly, there is nothing in the laws of physics
or biology to prevent this from occurring. My point is that the ultimate death
of our universe may not necessarily mean the death of intelligence. Of course,
if the ability to transfer intelligence from one universe to another is
possible, it leaves open the possibility that a life form from another
universe, facing its own big freeze, could try to burrow into some distant part
of our own universe, where it is warmer and more hospitable.

In other words,
the unified field theory, instead of being a useless but elegant curiosity, may
ultimately provide the blueprint for the survival of intelligent life in the
universe.

The Bible teaches us how to go to
heaven, not how the heavens go.

—Cardinal
Baronius, repeated by Galileo during his trial

Why is there something, rather than nothing? The unrest
which keeps the never-stopping clock of metaphysics going is the thought that
the non-existence of the world is just as possible as its existence.

—William James

The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious.
It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true
science. Whosoever does not know it and can no longer wonder, no longer marvel,
is as good as dead, and his eyes are dimmed.

—Albert Einstein

In 1863, Thomas H. Huxley
wrote,
"The question of all questions for humanity, the problem which lies behind
all others and is more interesting than any of them, is that of the
determination of man's place in Nature and his relation to the Cosmos."

Huxley was
famous as "Darwin's bulldog," the man who ferociously defended the
theory of evolution to a deeply conservative

Victorian
England. English society saw humanity standing proudly at the very center of
creation; not only was the solar system the center of the universe, but
humanity was the crowning achievement of God's creation, the pinnacle of God's
divine handiwork. God had created us in His very image.

By openly
challenging this religious orthodoxy, Huxley had to defend Darwin's theory
against the salvos launched by the religious establishment, thereby helping to
establish a more scientific understanding of our role in the tree of life.
Today, we recognize that, among the giants of science, Newton, Einstein, and
Darwin have done the yeoman's work in helping to define our rightful place in
the cosmos.

Each of them grappled
with the theological and philosophical implications of his work in determining
our role in the universe. In the conclusion to
Principia,
Newton declares, "The most beautiful system of the
sun, planes, and comets could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an
intelligent and powerful Being." If Newton discovered the laws of motion,
then there must be a divine lawgiver.

Einstein, too,
was convinced of the existence of what he called the Old One, but one who did
not intervene in the affairs of men. His goal, instead of glorifying God, was
to "read the Mind of God." He would say, "I want to know how God
created this world. I am not interested in this phenomenon or that. I want to
know God's thoughts. The rest are details." Einstein would justify his
intense interest in these theological matters by concluding, "Science
without religion is lame. But religion without science is blind."

But Darwin was
hopelessly divided on the question of the role of humanity in the universe.
Although he is credited as the one who dethroned humanity from the center of
the biological universe, he confessed in his autobiography concerning "the
extreme difficulty or rather impossibility of conceiving this immense and
wonderful universe, including man with his capacity for looking far backwards
and far into futurity, as the result of blind chance or necessity." He
confided to a friend, "My theology is simply a muddle."

Unfortunately,
the "determination of man's place in Nature and his relation to the
Cosmos" has been fraught with danger, especially to those who dared to
challenge the rigid dogma of the ruling orthodoxy. It was no accident that
Nicolaus Copernicus wrote his pioneering book,
De
Revolutionibus
Orbium Coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Orbs)
on his deathbed
in 1543, beyond the morbid reach of the Inquisition. It was also inevitable
that Galileo, who had been protected for so long by his powerful patrons in
the Medici family, would eventually suffer the wrath of the Vatican for
popularizing an instrument that revealed a universe that so sharply
contradicted church doctrine: the telescope.

The mixture of
science, religion, and philosophy is indeed a potent brew, so volatile that
the great philosopher Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake in 1600 in the
streets of Rome for refusing to repudiate his belief that there were an
infinite number of planets in the heavens, harboring an infinite number of
living beings. He wrote, "Thus is the excellence of God magnified and the
greatness of his kingdom made manifest; he is glorified not in one, but in
countless suns; not in a single earth, a single world, but in a thousand
thousand, I say in an infinity of worlds."

Galileo's and
Bruno's sin was not that they dared to divine the laws of the heavens; their true
sin was that they dethroned humanity from its exalted place at the center of
the universe. It would take over 350 years, until 1992, for the Vatican to
issue a belated apology to Galileo. No apology was ever issued to Bruno.

HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

Since Galileo, a
series of revolutions have overturned our conception of the universe and our
role in it. During the Middle Ages, the universe was seen as a dark,
forbidding place. Earth was like a small, flat stage, full of corruption and
sin, enclosed by a mysterious, celestial sphere where omens like comets would
terrify kings and peasants alike. And if we were deficient in our praise of
God and church, we would face the wrath of the theater critics, the
self-righteous members of the Inquisition and their hideous instruments of persuasion.

Newton and
Einstein freed us from the superstition and mysticism of the past. Newton gave
us precise, mechanical laws that guided all celestial bodies, including our
own. The laws were so precise, in fact, that human beings became mere parrots
reciting their lines. Einstein revolutionized how we viewed the stage of life.
Not only was it impossible to define a uniform measure of time and space, the
stage itself was curved. Not only was the stage replaced by a stretched rubber
sheet, it was expanding as well.

The quantum
revolution gave us an even more bizarre picture of the world. On one hand, the
downfall of determinism meant that the puppets were allowed to cut their
strings and read their own lines. Free will was restored, but at the price of
having multiple and uncertain outcomes. This meant that actors could be in two
places at the same time and could disappear and reappear. It became impossible
to tell for certain where an actor was on the stage or what time it was.

Now, the concept
of the multiverse has given us another paradigm shift, where the word
"universe" itself could become obsolete. With the multiverse, there
are parallel stages, one above the other, with trapdoors and hidden tunnels
connecting them. Stages, in fact, give rise to other stages, in a never-ending
process of genesis. On each stage, new laws of physics emerge. On perhaps only
a handful of these stages are the conditions for life and consciousness met.

Today, we are
actors living in act i, at the beginning of the exploration of the cosmic
wonders of this stage. In act 2, if we don't destroy our planet through
warfare or pollution, we may be able to leave Earth and explore the stars and
other heavenly bodies. But we are now becoming aware that there is the final
scene, act 3, when the play ends, and all the actors perish. In act 3, the
stage becomes so cold that life becomes impossible. The only possible salvation
is to leave the stage entirely via a trapdoor and start over again with a new
play and a new stage.

COPERNICAN
PRINCIPLE VS. ANTHROPIC PRINCIPLE

Clearly, in the
transition from the mysticism of the Middle Ages to the quantum physics of
today, our role, our place in the universe, has shifted dramatically with each
scientific revolution. Our world has been expanding exponentially, forcing us
to change our conception of ourselves. When I view this historic progression,
I am sometimes overwhelmed by two contradictory emotions, as I gaze upon the
seemingly limitless number of stars in the celestial firmament or contemplate
the myriad forms of life on Earth. On one hand, I feel dwarfed by the immensity
of the universe. When contemplating the vast, empty expanse of the universe,
Blaise Pascal once wrote, "The eternal silence of those infinite spaces
strikes me with terror." On the other hand, I cannot help but be
mesmerized by the splendid diversity of life and the exquisite complexity of
our biological existence.

Today, when
approaching the question of scientifically ascertaining our role in the
universe, there are in some sense two extreme philosophical points of view
represented in the physics community: the Copernican principle and the
anthropic principle.

The Copernican
principle states that there is nothing special about our place in the universe.
(Some wags have dubbed this the mediocrity principle.) So far, every
astronomical discovery seems to vindicate this point of view. Not only did
Copernicus banish Earth from the center of the universe, Hubble displaced the
entire Milky Way galaxy from the center of the universe, giving us instead an
expanding universe of billions of galaxies. The recent discovery of dark
matter and dark energy underscores the fact that the higher chemical elements
that make up our bodies comprise only 0.03 percent of the total matter/energy
content of the universe. With the inflation theory, we must contemplate the
fact that the visible universe is like a grain of sand embedded in a much
larger, flat universe, and that this universe itself may be constantly
sprouting new universes. And finally, if M-theory proves successful, we must
face the possibility that even the familiar dimensionality of space and time
must be expanded to eleven dimensions. Not only have we been banished from the
center of the universe, we may find that even the visible universe is but a
tiny fraction of a much larger multiverse.

Faced with the
enormity of this realization, one is reminded of the poem by Stephen Crane, who
once wrote,

A man said to the universe: "Sir, I exist!"

"However,"
replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of
obligation."

(One is reminded
of Douglas Adams's science fiction spoof
Hitchhiker's
Guide
to
the Galaxy,
in which there is a device called the Total Perspective
Vortex, which is guaranteed to transform any sane person into a raving lunatic.
Inside the chamber is a map of the entire universe with a tiny arrow reading,
"You are here.")