Is the universe a holographic reality?

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

A theory in the scientific sense is a well tested group of hypotheses that explain a massive amount of observations and experimental data. The theory of natural selection is an example, whereby theory denotes "natural selection" as an inducted, synthesizing principle which explains the question, "How did the diversity of life come to be in its current state?"

I personally would not call anything a theory that has not been observationally and/or experimentally verified.

Therefore, String "theory" not a theory, among many hypotheses I could have chosen as an example.

Sure. As I said I called it theory only because there was a specific prediction with the hypothesis and that prediction matches observed data (specifically the GEO600 data). I'm not trying to argue that its true or false... just that its something currently being studied and they're in the middle of actually doing experiments on the concept. That seems a lot closer to theory than ID for example, wherein there is nothing testable at all, or string theory where we currently have no observed data or good experiments to get observed data.

Is the Universe a holograph? Beats the hell out of me.
Are respected physicists experimenting on the topic? It seems that way, though I suppose Fermilab could have hired an idiot as their director, I dunno.
Is the topic bullshit? At the very least , a lot of hype around the topic seems like bullshit to me.

[Doktor Howl]

The federal government hiring an idiot for an important (read: patronage) post?

Perish the very notion.

[Bruno]

It's not like this FEMA, or something.

This is important shit.

[P3nT4gR4m]

So lemme get this straight, cutting edge theoretical scientists are exploring a notion which stuck me as patently obvious the first time I gave it any serious thought? And, for some reason, prolly best attributable to hysterical primate psychology, they think this is going to somehow change anything about the nature of reality. As someone who seems to be about 20 years ahead of them in their great thought experiment, perhaps I should contact them and tell them how it ends? Save some of this new age bullshit that seems in danger of taking hold here.

Allow me to spell it out - yes the holographic model holds true. All events and phenomena, past, present and future are contained therein. Time is largely an illusory delineation created by a function of consciousness. What does this mean?

Absofuckinglutely nothing! Barstool still hurts.

[the other anonymous]

I always preferred this holographic theory but only because it's fun to pronounce Ibozoo UU.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

The federal government hiring an idiot for an important (read: patronage) post?

Perish the very notion.

Myself not being a physicist, I suppose he could be a crank, but from what I've gathered he seems to be a well respected physicist.

So lemme get this straight, cutting edge theoretical scientists are exploring a notion which stuck me as patently obvious the first time I gave it any serious thought? And, for some reason, prolly best attributable to hysterical primate psychology, they think this is going to somehow change anything about the nature of reality. As someone who seems to be about 20 years ahead of them in their great thought experiment, perhaps I should contact them and tell them how it ends? Save some of this new age bullshit that seems in danger of taking hold here.

Allow me to spell it out - yes the holographic model holds true. All events and phenomena, past, present and future are contained therein. Time is largely an illusory delineation created by a function of consciousness. What does this mean?

Absofuckinglutely nothing! Barstool still hurts.

From what I read he's focused on holographic theory as a model not as a OMGZQUANTUMZ IS MAGICKS sort of thing. IIRC his big excitement was something about finally being able to measure minimum intervals of time. I think only newage cranks seem to think it will prove magic is science and up is down and the spoon is not a spoon but only a manifestation of our own conscious desire for soup or whatever the hell they babble on about.
I think its  yet another theory that is getting bad press based on uninformed commentary... much like entanglement, uncertainty etc.


http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/56605/title/Hogan%E2%80%99s_noise   <--- most accessible summation I've read of his work yet.

[Igor]

The holographic idea came out of black hole thermodynamics. Out of that era when the Black Hole Wars were raging. This was essentially an argument over whether black holes destroyed information. Another thing that came out of it was Hawking's prediction that black holes gave off radiation.

One of the many weird results of all the physics that was done at that time was the discovery that (given certain minimal assumptions) the total entropy of a black hole was proportional the square of the radius and not, as usually calculated, the cube.
Since entropy can be thought of as information, this means that the maximum amount of information that can be contained in a black hole is proportional to the area of its horizon.

Now, since a black hole is the densest possible configuration of matter, it follows that the maximum amount of information contained in the universe is also proportional to the area of its surface.


That's it. That's all it means.
However, it swiftly got co opted by the new-age quantum illusion magic spoon matrix crowd, who declared that we're all living in an alien simulation.
The fuckers.

[Kai]

Thank you. That was elegant and succinct.

[Telarus]

Thank you. That was elegant and succinct.

Agreed.

[LMNO]

Right on, Igor.

Let me know if you want to take over the position of explaining technical science stuff.  You seem to be better at it than me.

[Igor]

 

Don't know if I'll be taking over anything just yet though.

[Doktor Howl]

Of course, having hippies market pseudoscience under the most fashionable new scientific term is hardly new.

"The Tao of Physics".
"Quantum Healing".
etc, ad nauseum.

[Richter]

The monkeys saw indisctinct things in the cracks, and invented new gods every time

[Doktor Howl]

The monkeys saw indisctinct things in the cracks, and invented new gods every time

Ho ho!  I believe you have hit the nail on the head.  As accumulated knowledge deprives man of his old Gods, he will generate new ones based on improperly understood aspects of that accumulated knowledge.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

The holographic idea came out of black hole thermodynamics. Out of that era when the Black Hole Wars were raging. This was essentially an argument over whether black holes destroyed information. Another thing that came out of it was Hawking's prediction that black holes gave off radiation.

One of the many weird results of all the physics that was done at that time was the discovery that (given certain minimal assumptions) the total entropy of a black hole was proportional the square of the radius and not, as usually calculated, the cube.
Since entropy can be thought of as information, this means that the maximum amount of information that can be contained in a black hole is proportional to the area of its horizon.

Now, since a black hole is the densest possible configuration of matter, it follows that the maximum amount of information contained in the universe is also proportional to the area of its surface.


That's it. That's all it means.
However, it swiftly got co opted by the new-age quantum illusion magic spoon matrix crowd, who declared that we're all living in an alien simulation.
The fuckers.

Nicely stated!

However, I think its a bit more than that with Hogan's noise. I think he's theorizing that space and time may be made of grains of space/time which is very cool but still nothing like alien simulations

Hogan combines the idea of pixelated spacetime with the notion ... that a surface enclosing a volume of space encodes all the information contained in that volume. Just as the hologram imprinted on a credit card reveals a third dimension, so too does an imaginary surface in spacetime appear to create an extra dimension.